Page 11 - Microbiology and Life Science News
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January 24, 2012There is a good article in “The Scientist” this month that covers how various labs have improved the throughput for their flow cytometry applications. The piece covers some of the problems users experience with flow cytometry, namely its time-consuming nature, as well as the steps that actual users have taken to improve the process for themselves. Flow cytometry is a commonly used technique for performing cell counts and diagnosing diseases including leukemia. The use of flow cytometry to analyze cells in the fields of immunology research and drug discovery is growing thanks to new equipment that streamlines the process. A few of these solutions can cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars, so some of this equipment probably won’t be a feasible option for everyone. A less intensive-option that can improve processing speed is to outfit instruments with a well-plate sipper that can accept microtiter plates, such as the Empore 96-Well Solid Phase Extraction plates. The best solution
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December 28, 2011
In the spirit of reflection we wanted to take a look at some of our favorite posts from 2011 that you may have missed, or may want to revisit for the sake of nostalgia. It’s been an amazing year for us, and we hope everyone out there has made the most of it as well! Here’s wishing you all a Happy New Year!
- Performance Improvement of Cross-flow Filtration for High Level Waste Treatment (Feb. 2011) - Tips on improving your filtration setup from the Department of Energy and Savannah River National Laboratory.
- Bean to Bar at Theo Chocolates (Mar. 2011) - Our own Kristina Shahbazian went on a tour of the only bean-to-bar, organic, fair trade chocolate factory in the USA, located right here in Seattle.
- Legionella Sampling Just Got a Whole Lot Sexier (Apr. 2011) - How the Centers for Disease Control utilized filtration sampling and social media Epidemiology to track an outbreak of legionella bacterium at Playboy mansion's infamous grotto.
- Deadliest Carch: Man-Made Pollution (Jun. 2011) - A collective
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December 19, 2011In order to catch up with the massive backlog of chemical compounds that need toxicity assessments, the NIH, EPA, and FDA are expanding their Tox21 robot screening program to start testing a compound library of 10,000 samples. The Tox21 screening program was first conceived in 2005 and is a joint development between these three agencies. The Tox21 robot, located in Rockville, MD, was introduced earlier this year as the heart of the program and has already studied about 500 chemicals. To give you an idea of what an improvement this is, the EPA has only tested 200 chemicals since 1976. By speeding up chemical toxicity analysis the government will also accelerate the drug development process, as drug toxicity is one of the primary reasons new drugs fail. The six-ton Tox21 robot system can test thousands of chemicals simultaneously using its vast network of tiny wells to perform high-throughput, cell-based assays at 15 different concentrations. The robot system is able to identify which chemicals
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November 21, 2011
The National Institutes of Health, the primary medical research agency in the United States, is sponsoring a new competition for undergraduate students to design and develop innovative solutions to unmet health and clinical problems. This program, called The Design by Biomedical Undergraduate Teams (DEBUT) challenge, is being organized by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB) section of the NIH. At stake are $10,000 prizes in three categories – diagnostic devices, therapeutic devices, and technology to aid underserved populations and individuals with disabilities. Competitors must be full time undergraduate students and permanent residents of the US in order to qualify. Dr. Zeynep Erim, the architect of the challenge, said that the NIBIB’s objective for the participants is “to force the boundaries of their design skills and knowledge to develop innovative biomedical technology for health care.” Hopefully the spirit of this competition inspires them to
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November 07, 2011
This month’s Laboratory Equipment magazine features a reader survey on liquid handling devices that shows just how common these items are in the lab. In fact, 91% of the respondents indicated that they are using a liquid handling system, and about 75% are using their equipment at least several times per week. The most commonly used devices are pipets (75%) and pipet tips (70%), followed closely by syringes (68%) and then filters (67%). Less popular items include flow controllers (16%) and liquid level meters (10%). Overall, 80% of respondents said that they are completely or mostly satisfied with their equipment. Hopefully that group includes our customers… The uses for liquid handling devices are spread out across a range of applications without any dominant focus. The most frequent applications are basic research (36%) and sample preparation (34%). Less common answers include wastewater (16%), pharmaceutical (16%), and water analysis (20%).
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November 03, 2011Are you buying more lab equipment than in the past? You’re probably not alone according to the latest Forecast & Analysis report from Frost & Sullivan. Worldwide revenue for all laboratory products reached $36.2 billion in 2010, up 5.4% over last year. That number figures to keep climbing over the next few years as biopharmaceutical products become more prevalent and the Asian markets continue expanding. The United States continues to be the biggest spenders for laboratory products at $15.7 billion, followed closely by the European Union at $14.8 billion. However, for the best market potential we may look to India and China, where growth rates are in the double digits (the U.S. and Europe are only growing around 2-3%). Sadly, the report isn’t all good news. Government laboratories are seeing their budgets frozen or cut due to the weakened economy. As governments in the US and abroad continue to tighten their wallets, these laboratories, which include government-funded universities, are
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October 03, 2011
On the eve of the Nobel Prize announcements, last week the people over at Improbable Research handed out their annual Ig Nobel Prizes to recognize some peculiar scientific achievements. If you’re unfamiliar with the group or the prize, their stated criterion for winning this award is, “For achievements that first make people LAUGH then make them THINK.” Examples of award worthy research from this year include: finding out how our decision process is affected when we have a strong urge to urinate, discovering a type of beetle that mates with a certain type of beer bottle, and a special Peace Prize to the mayor of Vilnius, Lithuania, for running over illegally parked luxury cars with a tank. This tongue-in-cheek approach may put the Ig Nobel on par with something like the Razzies, except that the Improbable Research group isn’t (usually) mocking their recipients as many Ig Nobel winners are highly respected leaders in their fields. In fact, Andre Geim has the unique honor of having received
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September 27, 2011
Our newest product category features several items with different methods for determining if your lab materials have been properly sterilized. So to avoid confusion in what can be a life-or-death matter, we’ve pulled together some resources from the manufacturer of this line, 3M Health Care. This product line can be broken down into three categories: Physical monitors, chemical indicators, and biological indicators. Because each type has its own unique advantages and disadvantages, the organizations that publish guidelines for sterilization, such as the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and AAMI (Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation), recommend a combination of these monitoring types to get a clear picture of the sterilization process. Let’s break down each type of sterilization monitor and its pros and cons:
- Physical monitors – Includes gauges, electric readouts, etc.
- Pros – Provides real time information.
- Cons – Can only monitor one location at a time.
- Physical monitors – Includes gauges, electric readouts, etc.
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September 22, 2011Steroid hormones such as estrogen are known to have profound effects on our short-term and long-term physiology, but difficulty separating them from brain tissue has long been a hindrance to further analysis. Thankfully, a new study shows scientists from the University of Massachusetts and UCLA have found success in this area by incorporating Solid-Phase Extraction (SPE) into their testing protocol. Traditional methods of isolating steroid hormones (or “neurosteroids”) by liquid extraction are problematic because these compounds are lipid soluble and brain tissue is very rich in lipids, which turns sample preparation into a sort of scavenger hunt and can lead to inaccurate measurements. In order to solve this problem, the authors designed a two-stage protocol of liquid and solid-phase extraction, in this case using a vacuum manifold endcapped with Empore C18-SD cartridges on brain tissue samples taken from songbirds. The authors of the paper note that since its introduction SPE has been
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September 20, 2011The National Institutes of Health is having a busy week as they present a batch of new medical research funding to contributors across the country. The bulk of this funding comes from the 79 awards totaling $143.8 million being distributed through three different research programs designed to promote innovative research: the NIH Director’s Pioneer, the New Innovator, and the Transformative Research Project. As if that wasn’t enough, NIH also announced the recipients for the NIDA (National Institute on Drug Abuse) Avant-Garde Awards for Innovative Medication Development Research. The two winners, Dr. Kosten of Baylor College of Medicine and Dr. Burkhard of University of Connecticut, will each receive $500,000 per year for five years to support their projects. Dr. Kosten is developing a human methamphetamine vaccine, which would limit the amount the drug that reaches the brain and therefore prevent the user from getting high. This vaccine wouldn’t prevent someone from becoming addicted to
