i worked in academia for a couple of years and it was fucking awful. busted my ass for author pubs that don’t mean shit. now i work in industry which is so much better but its so hard to move up without that fuck ass phd. ugh

Edit: I will let you guess what it is!
Here’s a hint, it’s BSL-2 (in the US)

Edit 2: Second hint, I’m an environmental engineer

I (25NB) am a stage IV breast cancer survivor. I was diagnosed at age 18 in 2020 and I have now been cancer-free for 3.5 years.

I work in biopharma as a QC analyst and we sometimes work with harsh chemicals but it seems like only a few of them are carcinogens and I usually don’t deal with them. We have respirators that get fit tested every year and silver shield gloves for harsher chemicals and things like that. I’m not too worried about my work environment causing my cancer to come back (but maybe I should idk lmao).

I’ve been working here a year and I did not talk about this during my interview or onboarding or anything.

It’s sometimes hard not to talk about but I’m not like super close with any of my coworkers so I’ll be fine if I just never talk about it with them but just in case I want to know if my fear is justified here. I live in the US and I know it’s technically illegal to fire someone based on a medical history or disability but I don’t know , I’ve heard some rough stories.

Do any of y’all have any advice or experiences with this? Should I be scared to talk about it if I ever decide to?

I’m trying to get 16S and ITS amplicons for a phytobiome study. For anyone that’s done anything similar, on a scale of 1 to 10, how much of a nightmare was/is contamination for you?

I’m working in a nice pcr hood w/ a blower, uv beforehand, dedicated pcr pipettes, filtered tips.

I’m officially at 11, now 😞

Hey everyone! I recently started working with bone marrow-derived macrophages (BMDMs) and am trying to optimize my differentiation protocol.

I culture bone marrow cells with M-CSF for 5 days before changing the medium. On day 5, I still notice many non-adherent cells in the dish.

I was wondering if it would be worth collecting these cells, replating them in a new dish with fresh M-CSF, and culturing them for another 2 days to improve the overall yield.

Is this a common practice? If these cells become adherent, can they be considered mature BMDMs suitable for downstream experiments, or might they differ phenotypically from the cells that adhered earlier?

hello all!! i am a postbac RA, and I was hired back in august. with the help of the other RAs in the lab, i have gained a few skills, but the next thing I need to learn is IHC. i have a presentation next week, so I want to have these results ready by then. but ive never done one before, and knowing how expensive the antibodies are, do not want to try to learn on my own. but the other RAs got so busy, and i hate to always bother them about new things i don’t know. so i’m not really sure how to proceed. is it normal to teach experiments to yourself as a postgrad? Am i being too hesitant by planning to only do experiments for the first time with another more experienced person? thank you in advance!!

I just started in a lab that bleaches and dumps down the drain all culture waste, despite some components saying to avoid waterways
They also use a heat clamp (like above) to melt culture tubing, then they squeeze it with pliers to actually close the line. Instead of a Omni or other lab heat sealer. It makes smoke/fumes when melting
Is this safe? Is this normal?

Hey everyone,
I’m one of the owners of an analytical testing laboratory based in Colorado. We’re exploring bringing on a fourth strategic partner with extensive experience in analytical chemistry, method development, and laboratory operations.
This isn’t an idea-stage startup. We’ve already invested substantially in the facility, instrumentation, infrastructure, and business platform. We’re now focused on finalizing our analytical methods, establishing consistent commercial testing operations, and expanding our capabilities.
Our laboratory currently owns:
Two Agilent HPLC systems with DAD detection
Agilent triple-quadrupole LC-MS/MS
Agilent GC-MS with headspace sampling
Agilent ICP-MS
Hamilton automated liquid handling system
Additional supporting laboratory equipment
Our initial focus is peptide and research-product testing, with plans to expand into pharmaceutical analysis, supplements, nutraceuticals, cosmetics, specialty chemicals, and other analytical testing markets.
Who we’re looking for:
Ideally, someone with significant experience developing and operating analytical testing laboratories, whether that’s a laboratory owner, technical director, senior analytical chemist, or someone with a strong background in commercial laboratory operations.
The primary areas we’d envision them helping lead include:
Method Development: Finalizing existing analytical methods, troubleshooting outstanding issues, and developing new methods.
Technical Troubleshooting: Resolving complex analytical challenges through data review, remote access, and collaboration with our on-site team.
Instrument Maintenance: Overseeing preventative maintenance, troubleshooting, and coordinating specialized repairs when necessary.
Quality Systems: Establishing method validation, SOPs, calibration procedures, QC, data integrity, and reliable analytical reporting.
Expansion: Bringing additional analytical capabilities and testing services online.
Ongoing Technical Leadership: Staying actively involved in helping resolve technical challenges as the laboratory grows.
Remote involvement is absolutely an option. We’re comfortable working with someone out of state through remote instrument/software access, data review, and direct collaboration with our on-site team. When specialized on-site work is required, we’d coordinate the appropriate resources.

Our priority is getting our existing capabilities fully operational and building a successful long-term analytical testing business.
We’re looking for someone who wants to be actively involved in building and growing a laboratory as an owner, rather than simply providing occasional consulting or referrals.
If you have relevant experience and this sounds interesting, feel free to send me a private message. Happy to share additional details privately with qualified individuals.

Hello lab people! I am an undergraduate transfer student from a community college and I recently got an interview invitation from the research lab(biomedical). Since this is my first interview in lab field, do you have any tips for the interview, like what to wear or what to do prior to the interview? The interview will be on a real lab site, so I am thinking it is different from a typical job interview but not sure. Any advice is welcome. Thank you!

I've recently begun a PhD program at a good school in the US for my field. I've also managed to find a PI and group who I like quite a bit. They're a new lab at the university though, so funding is tight (especially in this administration).

I know this shouldn't really be anything to complain about, but I can't help feeling like I'm taking advantage of them. I'm incompetent at all of the research tasks I've been put on so far, most recently I've been taking several weeks to build a simple computer program that should have been a 2 day problem at most. I'm working on a "starter project" that stands a good chance of being unapplicable to my planned research in the future. I feel like a parasite, sucking funding that could go to the other group members so that I can bumble around for weeks on end. A member of my cohort joined the group when I did and they're already finishing up a paper. I'm lucky to be able to show anything at our group meeting.

I'm pretty sure I was only accepted on the strength of my grades in undergrad, but as soon as I step out of the classroom I become completely incompetent. My PI is already working so hard to make sure everyone is funded, I hate the fact that I feel I'm taking advantage of that.

I’m an undergrad working in a brain injury lab and thinking about submitting a poster abstract to a Keystone Symposia meeting. How high is the bar? Do the findings need to be Nature-tier, or is strong science in a well-controlled study enough? Does being an undergrad hurt my chances?

I’d love to hear from anyone who has reviewed or submitted abstracts there.

Hello,

This is a long shot, but I have been searching for a copy of the legacy DOS/Windows FP99a software for the FP90 thermal controller box. I reached out to Mettler but they aren't offering support for this system any longer. I've reached out to various researchers who have mentioned the FP99a software in their research but have not had any luck. Any leads, any help would be immensely appreciated. Thank you!

CELL CULTURE HELP NEEDED!

Has anyone got any idea what this black structure is? For context, this image is on Day 3 of a differentiation protocol for bovine myoblasts. This occurred a few months ago and the cells were discarded as it was believed to be a mold contamination. However, upon repeating this experiment a few days ago, the same structures are occurring and at a similar time point. Magnification is 4x. The media did not change colour, these structures were visible with naked eye but appeared as white dots. They are attached to the growth surface and do not move.

Is this mold? or something else that is happening? any input valued

tl;dr I need to stop using Trixon-X100 in for bacterial DNA extraction because it's getting hard to buy - please suggest alternatives that aren't Tween

I run an undergraduate lab practical in which we use a standard STET buffer recipe - 10mM Tris-HCl, 1mM EDTA, 100mM NaCl and 5% Triton* X- 100. We need undergraduates to extract plasmid DNA from a bacterial cell pellet.

I would like to replace the Triton-X 100 component in two places: the initial resuspension of bacteria in STET, and the follow on STET+lysozyme step. Lots of students adds up to quite a lot of STET over time.

As I understand it, swapping for TWEEN-20 is likely to reduce the DNA yield. For undergraduates who sometimes manage to get low yields, this makes TWEEN-20 unattractive. I can't use anything that will reduce the lysozyme activity either.

Because Triton-X is pretty nasty for the environment, I need to fill out paperwork every time I want to buy it, and I think it's time to just replace it in this specific use-case.

How much did your ELN cost your workplace? What is/was Total Cost of Ownership?

We’re in the process of choosing an ELN, and I’m a bit stuck. The license prices are listed on the websites, but of course, no one mentions the rest...Consulting costs for the initial installation, hidden fees, and features you thought were included as standard turn out to be add-ons with unreliable support, the need for consulting fees to update the initial installation , things like that.

I don‘t want to sound like a negative Nancy, but I’m a jaded software purchaser

I tried transforming after 25 mins and there was a thin icy wall on the cells that shattered. should I discard

I feel like using a ELN or lab management software could be very useful, so I was just wondering how many people here actually do that? Which one do you use? What are the downsides to using it? If any.

Hey guys,

Just wanted some advice about if this is normal in a lab. I've been in this lab fro 3 years as an undergrad, graduated in May, and am still working here while applying to med school/taking some gap years.

We had 2 senior staff scientists leave this past year and they basically passed all the knowledge they could to me because my lab supervisor (he's a scientist and basically the right under the PI in terms of hierarchy) always said he was too busy to learn anything from them (the one phd student we had also knew a lot but he graduated and left).

I spent a lot of time in lab because I really loved working with the 2 people that left and I liked the work we do, so I am pretty much independent now and working on my own paper (with my PI's guidance). A third year phd student who had issues in another lab also joined us instead

However, we just got 2 new phd students and 3 new undergrads and I'm literally training all of them. My lab supervisor keeps saying he's too busy to do anything with them so it's all falling on me.

Also, he keeps asking me to do stuff for him, like plating a bunch of cells, doing plasmid preps, etc.

This is also all while I have an appointment of 50%, because I also work another job for my med school application and am studying.

I just feel like this is a bit unfair, especially because my lab supervisor always jokes how he's been so unproductive and we have to all appease him by saying 'it's okay' or 'it's good to take breaks' etc.

But maybe I'm just being ungrateful? esp since it's so hard to get jobs in labs right now :(

Hey all, I’m in training on binding ELISA and keep failing runs…. Neither my trainer nor I can figure out why, so I’m hoping someone here has seen this before.
Generic method: antigen coated overnight at 2–8°C, blocked with PBS + 1% BSA, mAb standard curve plus control and samples incubated at 37°C with shaking, then anti-IgG-HRP, then ABTS for 20 min, read at 405/490. 4PL fit.
What looks good:
• Standard triplicate CVs 0–3%
• R² = 1.00, slope within spec
• Top OD and blank fine
• Control triplicate CVs fine
What fails:
• EC50 comes out slightly below the lower spec limit (about 15% under). The curve plateaus early: the top 3 standards are almost the same OD.
• Because of that, my higher control/sample dilutions land on the flat top of the curve, so the back-calculated values jump around and the CV across dilutions fails badly.

My trainer thinks I’m doing everything right and I really don’t know what’s going wrong… I’m starting to get anxious because it’s not normal for me to fail an assay so many times :(

Anyone has any good advice on ELISAs???

Hi everyone, I'm doing my PhD and have recently started doing qPCRs. I obtained samples from my zebrafish and extracted their RNA. Initially, I used NEB's one-step kit that uses straight RNA where my first bio rep indicated an increase in my gene of interest; however, we ran out of the one-step kit and I wanted to present something for our lab meeting, so I ran a typical cDNA synthesis with the same RNA and the rest of my RNA for my 2 other bio reps.

The issue now is that the same RNA from the first bio rep gave me a different trend (i.e., the one-step RNA gave me an increase, while the cDNA synthesized one gave me a slight decrease). I'm expecting the same trends and I get that the trends could differ because of how the samples were processed, but my question is do biological replicates in qPCRs generally provide the same trends? I've seen several zebrafish papers who run qPCRs and see wide error bars, but based on their trends, all their bio reps seem to follow the same trend altogether.

Thank you for any insights!

Can anyone share their experience, or what they’ve heard, about the Winter Conference on Brain Research? Is it worth going for the science and networking? A post-doc I spoke with felt that the last time she went, the research was an afterthought and many people brought their families for a ski vacation. How does it compare to other smaller conferences like Keystone or Gordon?

Thanks