Welcome to the first volume of our 2024 product release notes! We’ve been working hard to bring you performance improvements that add value to your work. Read on to learn about the product enhancements and bug fixes released in January 2024.
Notebook
Benchling Notebook helps users log their experiments, create protocols, and capture results against their samples.
Updates to table refresh [2024.1.N.1]
When refreshing a table, submitted rows are replaced with the object data that already exists in the backend.
For example, if a user registers Plasmid 123 in a Registration table and clicks Refresh, the row containing data for Plasmid 123 is cleared and replaced with the data in the Registry for Plasmid 123.
Frozen chips [2024.1.N.2]
Users can now freeze entry chips so they no longer live fetch updates made to entities referenced in an entry after the entry is locked in the In review and Accepted review stages.
INTERCEPT() table function [2024.1.N.3]
Users can now use the INTERCEPT function in the notebook. To view this function’s syntax, visit Microsoft’s help center.
SLOPE() table function [2024.1.N.4]
Users can use the SLOPE function in the notebook. To view the function’s syntax, visit Microsoft’s help center.
Molecular Biology
Benchling’s Molecular Biology is a cutting-edge in silico design tool that supports the latest scientific workflows.
New organism supported in codon optimization [2024.1MB.1]
Plasmodium falciparum codon usage table now available for use in codon optimization.
New RNA sequences match-bases and search-bases endpoints [2024.1.MB.2]
Users can now use 2 new RNA sequences list endpoints: match-bases and search-bases.
In Vivo
Manage in vivo studies with modern software designed for data capture, collaboration, and insights.
Study design cloning [2024.1.IV.1]
Users can now reuse previous study designs to streamline the design of new studies. Cloning a study populates the relevant sections of a draft form for your next study. Users can then make required changes before submitting for approval.
Add study metadata after a study is created [2024.1.IV.2]
Users with Write permissions to a study can now add new metadata fields from the study settings.
Edit animal details from study [2024.1.IV.3]
Users can now edit animal details, including sex, DOB, species, strain and metadata, in a tabular interface from the study animals table.
Registry and Inventory
The Registry and Inventory combine to form an extremely powerful solution for life sciences R&D samples. The Registry can be used to model and log any biological entities while the Inventory provides an interactive digital window into the physical storage system of your lab.
Enable selecting and deselecting samples for inventory shortcuts in workflows [2024.1.RI.1]
Users can now select or deselect containers in the table to take an action on. Previously, users had to take an action on all containers in a workflow task table.
Audit label printing with Zebra printing [2024.1.RI.2]
Users can now view when labels are printed with Zebra Print in audit logs. Previously, when printing labels for container, box, and plate barcodes using Zebra Browser Print, these events weren’t tracked in audit logs.
Support selecting and deselecting samples when conducting an action via workflow shortcuts [2024.1.RI.3]
Users can now deselect containers within inventory shortcuts from a workflow task table and not commit an action on deselected containers.
Insights
Insights enables users to query, visualize, and share high-quality, structured data that resides in Benchling.
Renamed "Datasets" to "Analysis Tables" in the UI [2024.1.IN.1]
"Datasets" was renamed to "Analysis Tables" but functionality didn’t change.
Updated Insights dashboard axes scientific notation behavior [2024.1.IN.2]
Users can now view the raw value of a data point in non-scientific notation in the tooltip that displays when hovering over a tooltip. The y-axis now only starts converting numbers to scientific notation at 1e-3.
Updated PersistedDataFrame to "data frame" in audit logs [2024.1.IN.3]
"PersistedDataFrame" in audit logs have been updated to "data frame". Audit logs have been backfilled to display the updated naming.
Published JMP Add-in version 1.2 [2024.1.IN.4]
Updates include:
- Include file and filename for file POST requests
- Migrate to /data-frames endpoints
- Efficiency improvements for data uploads
Benchling Connect
Benchling Connect, formerly Lab Automation, enables seamless integration of Benchling to liquid handlers, plate readers, imaging instruments, and more.
Update to Molecular Devices, SoftMax Pro adapter [2024.1.BC.1]
Processing data exported from Molecular Devices SoftMax Pro (SMP) plate reader software is now supported, which contains either measurements from multiple plates or "group data" from experimental groups as specified in SMP.
Release of Chemometec, NucleoView adapter [2024.1.BC.2]
Processing data exported from Chemometec NucleoView cell counter software is now supported, which includes handling of data from cell counter models such as the NC-200.
To enable this feature, contact a Benchling representative.
Release of Unchained Labs, Lunatic adapter [2024.1.BC.3]
Processing data exported from Unchained Labs Luntic & Stunner Analysis software is now supported for results generated with the Lunatic plate reader. Processing results from Stunner instruments aret not supported at this time.
To enable this feature, contact a Benchling representative.
Add to Analysis button on Result tables embedded in runs [2024.1.BC.4]
Users can now use the Add to Analysis button in Result tables embedded in runs.
To enable this feature, contact a Benchling representative.
Application Core
To create a seamless Benchling experience, our platform must be consistent, compliant and predictable. The Application Core provides the central capabilities platform to create a smoother user experience.
Owner added as an optional filter in global search secondary filters [2024.1.AC.1]
Users can now filter certain types, like projects or template collections, by the owner of those types. Secondary filtering by owner is not supported for every type.
Compliance Controls
With Compliance Controls, gathering required information for compliance is simple, intuitive, and performant. The team’s primary focus is on our auditing platform but we also own exporting and archiving.
Notebook entry context for audit trails [2024.1.CC.1]
The "Parent Item X" column in structured table audit trails now displays notebook entry context whenever a storable item, like a plate or container, gets created via a structured table within a notebook entry. This is to help provide traceability into the audit logs of the originating entry source of storable data.
Developer Platform
Our developer platform is fundamental to centralizing and standardizing all your R&D data. Benchling’s APIs and Events are built to match the flexibility and speed of modern life science R&D.
Enable app manifest upload without webhook URL [2024.1.DP.1]
Uploading a Benchling App manifest now no longer requires a webhook URL to be present in the manifest file. Instead, a warning displays when an app does not have a URL specified.
New column in user export file for “API Key Created” [2024.1.DP.2]
API key creation and rotation time are now available to the users export in the admin console. This enables customer admins to more easily inspect all users for stale keys that should be rotated.
Added createdAt and modifiedAt timestamps to Workflows APIs [2024.1.DP.3]
Users can now use createdAt and modifiedAt timestamps to all Workflows APIs.
Bug Fixes
The following bugs were fixed this month:
In Vivo
- Users were unable to move more than 1 cage at a time to another study
- Incorrect validation was displayed when editing samples with select metadata fields
- Cages could be deleted while animals were still in the cage
Registry and Inventory
- Could not archive individual fixed plate wells
Workflows
- Legacy Workflows output-samples API was returning input samples. The endpoint now correctly returns output samples
- In our API endpoints, Workflows tasks and outputs were returning a blank webURL. They now return their actual webURL
- Tasks couldn’t be archived from the Task Details page
- Downstream nodes from a router (between the branch and merge points) were not required to connect to the merge point
Access Management
- Error message on sign in checkbox read "keep me signed in". It was updated to "Sign me out when browser is closed" to better explain the behavior of the checkbox
Application Core
- Config migration failed unexpectedly when trying to update a field that a computed field depended on
- Templates incorrectly default mapped in config migration
- Execution templates displayed on the wrong page of config migration
Compliance Controls
- The "Enable_Exports" flag would previously dictate whether exporting audit logs was possible in the UI. The configuration of this flag no longer impacts audit log exports throughout the UI which are now auto-on