Many laboratory and healthcare personnel currently conduct assays (experiments) using paper notebooks and generic office software. Unfortunately, the current systems employed do not allow for a unified system to design, develop, evaluate, execute, optimize, analyze, and share assays.
Many scientists store their protocols using a combination of methods and rely heavily on paper documents to create protocols and share results. This creates several problems in cases where a notebook is lost, a file is missing, and the notes are misinterpreted by others. Furthermore, strict regulatory guidelines require audits where it may be difficult, if not impossible, to locate particular protocols as there is no search capability for hand-written documents.
As scientists design and develop their assays they often search the available literature via local libraries and the World Wide Web. They must often read through large volumes of protocols, in an attempt to build their own assay protocol. This process is time intensive, and once an assay is developed, simple math errors result in unreliable data. Furthermore, assay variation can result from lack of documenting all required parameters.