A system was devised to aid in the inspection of Micro Electrode assemblies utilized in clinical lab instruments to conduct impedance measurements on living cells in a 384 bottomless well casing with the said electrode layer bonded to the housing creating the closed cell real time data acquisition instrument for assay tests.

Previous inspection was conducted manually utilizing microscopes. The drawback to this process is that it is extremely strenuous to the quality technicians since they are constantly utilizing their human visual sensory ability and cognitive reasoning in making the pass fail decision. Furthermore, OSHA regulation limits the activity of cognitive ergonomics exposure. Cognitive Ergonomics is concerned with mental processes, such as perception, memory, reasoning, and motor response, as they affect interactions among humans and other elements of a system.

Purpose of this automated vision inspection system is to inspect Micro Electrodes for opens on an electrode assembly layer (card) mounted on PET film

The real world measurement width of the fingers of the interdigital electrodes is only 100 um. During various post processing techniques of the electrode assembly there is a large probability of damaging the vacuum vapor deposited gold layer on PET film. Cards with said defect need to be removed from the product stream. False accepts can not be tolerated since this would make the final test plate defective in the field measurement instrument. This design requirement drove all the hardware selection decisions and engineering sizing for the said system.