A chain of custody (CoC) is a process that tracks the movement and control of an asset through its lifecycle by documenting the people who handle it, actions taken against it, and when they were taken. The container history CoC is the reporting mechanism for the sample chain of custody, a critical tool for managing sample handoffs to ensure the integrity and reliability of sample data from collection to administration.
A container history report is a document containing the history of an entity within a container, including who handled the sample and when, what actions were performed against the sample, and the locations, dates, and times of those actions. After downloading the report, you can review it to track information, like how many people handled the sample, its location changes over time, and under what storage conditions the sample was maintained.
Download the container history report
Container history reports download as a zipped file with 1 report per container. You can download container history reports from the containers themselves or from global search.
Download from the container
To download the report:
- Select the container or well within a box or plate. You can also navigate to the container or well directly.
- Click Export report, then click Export Chain of Custody - Container History.
- Select PDF or CSV format from the drop-down menu in the pop-up window.
- Click Export.
Download from global search
To download the report in global search:
- In global search, click the > at the top to open the expanded view.
- Click the Type drop-down menu and select the container type under Containers.
- Select the containers of interest.
- Click the Export icon in the top-right corner and click Export Chain of Custody - Container History.
- Select PDF or CSV format from the drop-down menu in the pop-up window.
- Click Export.
View the container history report
Reports render in an intuitive format that includes one update per row, before and after changes in separate columns, and consistent formatting across all change events.
The table below describes each column in the audit log and what they represent.
Column name | Column description |
Timestamp (UTC) | Datetime the activity occurred |
User | Username for the account that made the update. |
Activity description | Overview of the action performed |
Item | Object the action was performed on |
Old value | Previous value before change occurred, if the action resulted in an item value changing |
New value | New value after change occurred, if the action resulted in an item value changing |
Container | Container the report was exported from. If the event was an entity transfer, this field populates the container the entity was transferred into. |
Entity | The entity or entities in the container |
Inventory location | Inventory path (location hierarchy) for the container |