World first imaging incubator uses unconventional approach to monitor embryos

Genea Biomedx has created an incubation instrument with time lapse photography, which allows scientists and potential parents to watch their embryos grow in their first crucial few days.

There are over 1.5 million IVF cycles a year helping people fulfill their dream of having a family. One of the challenges of IVF is the need for embryologists to remove embryos from the incubator to review them under the microscope, taking them out of the ideal growth conditions for short periods of time.

Genea Biomedx asked the simple question: What if we could integrate a low-cost imaging solution within the incubator itself, thereby eliminating the need to remove the embryo from its safe environment for grading? The answer to this challenge would not lie in conventional IVF technology.

Working with Planet Innovation, Genea Biomedx bucked the market trend of developing a bigger, more expensive microscope. Instead, it looked beyond the medical industry and discovered a low cost imaging system that could achieve an image quality suitable for embryologists to assess key embryo features.

The imaging incubator, known as Geri, is different to other incubators on the market in that it combines a low-cost multi-camera imaging system with individually controlled multi-patient incubator chambers. This means that embryologist can assess an embryo’s development by observing high-quality time-lapse images while the embryo remains safely contained within the regulated environment of an embryonic incubator. All this was made possible through the unorthodox approach of integrating high quality camera technology from non-medical industries.

Update: National broadcaster, 7 News, reported on the story here.