Design Of Software For Patch-Clamp System Based USB Data Acquisition

Nowadays, Patch Clamp Technique has already become a general method in the field of modern electrophysiological research. With the development of data acquisition system, which is the data transmission and control center in the patch clamp system, software in Patch Clamp System will be updated. In order to control the latest USB-based data acquisition device in patch-clamp system, which is named UDA-I, we should develop new application which can run in Windows 2000/XP operation systems. Model of the system is built with Unified Model Language in Objected-Oriented methodology. Work flows of Unified Process are introduced in this thesis, including requirements, analyses, designs, and implementations. The period of Unified Process is use case-drive. So use case model is introduced in detail, and use case specification is given in the thesis. We analyzed and designed the classes in the system using UML, a kind of visual modeling tools, including data structure classes, driver-called interface class, document/view classes and dialog classes. The application is easy to upgrade and maintain, being structured by reasonable data structure. This software is an MFC-based application of Windows operating system, and is designed using multi-thread and dynamic link techniques. We have coded and complied successfully during implement work flow. The application can implement two work modes, including the Voltage Patch mode and the Current Patch mode. Episodic Mode and Gapfree Mode are used in the software, which are two kinds of record modes. The application includes some new characters, such as P/n algorithm, single run saving enable, plenty graph control function, and friendly GUI. Finally, we used the beta version of the application in the actual experiment and gain approving data. The results demonstrate that the software can control the data acquisition device to output precise wave and input response of the target cells. The application is proved valid in the field of electrophysiological experimentation.