User Needs: Chemistry
Pipettes coming into direct contact with chemicals or materials must not be reactive, or must have a coating to prevent the pipette material from interacting with the chemical. Pipettes also should have a coating to reduce the liquid adhesion with the pipette walls.
Devices that perform the pipetting must be able to control the volume of liquid collected and injected with minimal error, and should avoid introducing air bubbles into the liquid or otherwise disturbing the liquid.
Plastic pipettes are typically not well-designed for organic solvents, so organic chemistry labs use glass Pasteur pipettes.
User Needs: Biology (from interview with Olivia Foster)
Sterility: pipets/tips should come sterile or be able to be sterilized via autoclaving (material that can withstand that heat/pressure), should not have a risk of liquids staying inside a pipet and contaminating another sample
Fast/low effort to use: it shouldn’t take more than a few seconds to prepare to use, about as long as it takes now to put a plastic pipet tip on
Easy to use/similar to current designs: people won’t want to have to learn a complex device that is much different from what is used now in the lab, have only a few buttons to control, not complicated
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