Introduction
Automation has the power to transform the scale of discovery possible in biology. At present, however, a key limiting factor is the high cost of the specialised equipment needed. Commercially available automated versions of common biological equipment can cost orders of magnitude more than their manual counterparts. Nevertheless the components of many such systems are not inherently expensive. The advent of widespread 3D printing technology, and the availability of aluminium extrusions that simplify linear motion, provides opportunities for purpose-built labware created in-house using open source designs \cite{Baden_2015,Coakley_2016}.
Automation increases throughput, in part because robots can work continually. But to truly realise these benefits, and minimise the need for human intervention, automated systems needs the ability to store the physical inputs and outputs to their processes, typically in the SBS standard microplate format \cite{ansislas1-2004}.
Here we present a simple low-cost design which allows the vertical racking of 6 to 24 standard sized microplates with automated storage and retrieval. This provides a storage system that can be interfaced with other robotic systems.