Chronicles of the laboratory: a rat in a polymer helmet, spectral analysis of a can of chips and blue electrical tape

Meet the experimental rat Theodore Jr.

As many know, I changed my occupation and now most of the time I have been engaged in cultivating super-soldiers and enslaving the world with stem cells. I just want to warn you - the work in our laboratory is connected with the NDA, so some things I will touch only superficially.
When you are engaged in science, then very often there is a need to solve complex and non-standard tasks. No matter how glossy and beautiful your portable colliders, lovingly instrumented for development, may be, it is sometimes necessary to create something “on your knee” to test some idea. This is particularly acute in state institutions, where, despite often excellent funding, the law forces an intergalactic tender for the purchase of a pencil to be organized. Therefore, I will tell you about the blue electrical tape, spectral analysis using a can of chips and artistic modeling of an exoskeleton for a mutant rat. But at the same time we will find out whether it is worthwhile to sink dry ice in the toilet and whether it is possible to drink it later.

What are we doing here at all?

The first logical question that may arise is who are all these suspicious people in white coats? Despite the fact that we are all doctors, our work is not directly related to patients. In our laboratory, we are developing in the field of regenerative medicine, working with stem cells.

Here are our kids

We grow and we grow our pets in special bioreactors. No, not in those in which, according to Lurka's precepts, it is necessary to throw those representatives of Homo Sapiens, which aggravate the gene pool. In our version, these are special incubators, where cells happily eat goodies, carefully added by our wonderful employees, and in every possible way pose under the eyepieces of the microscope. The bioreactor maintains an ideal temperature, a high level of carbon dioxide in the gas mixture - 5%, is fatal for humans, but the cells are happy.

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All this beauty is needed not just like that, but to develop methods of treating patients who do not turn them into cyborgs with pacemakers, prosthetic joints and other pleasures of Deus Ex, but those that allow directed regeneration in the affected area. In short, it works. And the results are sometimes frankly amazing. However, in this direction still digging and digging.

Survival in the lab

In addition to these, undoubtedly important moments, there are a lot of unobvious nuances that become clear in the process of work. For example, it is not necessary to work with deoxycholate in the form of powder outside a fume hood. And the more so you should not inhale it. No, you can, of course, if you really want. Only the lungs will dissolve slightly. As a solution, it is used to emulsify cell membranes when cells are destroyed. Also, an extremely useful habit is to glance at a quartz lamp when you enter the room. Sometimes her included status is not particularly noticeable against the background of normal lighting, and her tan is not very, honest.


It is not recommended to go into the culture block, leaving no one outside. Especially on Friday night. The fact is that the area where stem cells grow has no less stringent requirements for cleanliness than the processor manufacturing plant. The same pressure zones, pressure drops between the locks, so that the air from the clean zone always blows only towards the “dirty” side. But as always there is a nuance. Armored glass. I have no idea who came up with such a great idea, but a fact. Apparently, the results of the experiments could not break through, trying to devour the brains of the surviving personnel. But, as is usually the case, all the joys do not end there. By a strange coincidence, the culture block is very similar to the Faraday cage. Not that the stem cells were alarmed by electromagnetic radiation, it just happened. In short, you definitely do not want to be alone or with a colleague in a room where you don’t catch a cell phone, the glasses are armored, and the electric drive of the door has decided to rest for a while. Not for long. Till Monday.
In general, in such a team, all these little things do not spoil the overall picture at all. It is really interesting to work, very colorful personalities have come up. Our wonderful foreign professor is especially epic, under the strict guidance of which all the research is carried out. When, communicating with you, he increases the coefficient of “fucks per minute” to a critical point, interspersing elegant expressions in Italian or German, it is immediately clear that something in the design has gone wrong. Without him it would not be so fun.

What to do if you brought half a bucket of dry carbon dioxide

Some of our reagents and materials require particularly gentle handling. Therefore, there are situations when a courier brings you a box of enormous foam plastic, inside of which there is a huge amount of dry ice granules and a ma-a-a-little test tube, which costs so much that it makes you think that these are tears of a virgin collected during the top of the Himalayas. And what is the fun in such assumptions? That's right - packaging. Actually, a couple of videos below vividly illustrate a small part of the disgraces that can be created with dry CO2. And yes. Sorry for the vertical video, wrong) It is because of this turned into 4K, shot at Canon EOS 600D.


It was also very funny to watch the expression on the woman’s face at the checkout in the student’s canteen, after I poured a few pellets into a compote of dried fruit. With dialogue in the spirit of:
- What happened to the compote?
- It boils.
- Clear. * pokerface * With you 18 rubles.
Compote, by the way, as a result becomes fizzy, which was a pretty funny bonus.
The toilet remained alive, although it was covered with a mysterious perspiration and gushed forth with a cold fog. It looked funny.

Fun to be a hybrid

Selection of the necessary objects on color microscopy. Immunochemical staining

Being a “clean” narrow specialist is wonderful. But it so happened that I myself felt the full range of bonuses of my additional, “IT” direction. Very many tasks are perfectly algorithmic, and it is much easier to make something work in terms of software if you are also an expert in the subject area. As a result, the rudimentary knowledge about the principles of color deconvolution, which led to algorithms for automatically counting the number of cells with different colors, suddenly came in handy… colleagues. And I understand about it like a cockroach in plasma physics.
Also, the love of opensource and Linux in particular, allowed to deploy one of my favorite tools - Owncloud. This versatile processor has provided our laboratory with a shared file storage, versioning, backups, and other goodies. A side effect of screwing https with a certificate from StartSSl was the inability to filter synchronized traffic on our university server. Before that, all video files were mercilessly cut. However, our admins can be understood. For the entire medical school channel of 10 megabits.
In general, thanks to free software, many tasks have been greatly simplified without any additional financial investments. For example, I’m happy to draw illustrations for articles in Inkscape, edit something in Gimp, work with LibreOffice with documentation and articles and use xmind actively to plan and develop new techniques.

Pencil electrodes

Another insanely useful thing in the lab is the Arduino, a bunch of body kit sensors, relay blocks, and a bag of wires. A bit of magic, blue electrical tape and now the prototype of some future automated ultra-mixer with heating and pH analysis is ready. No matter how scolded Arduino is for its limitations, inhibition, and so on, these are real professionals, for people like me this is a great tool. Finished devices are often completely inhumane money, despite the fact that it is often impossible to force them to work together, within the framework of a single logic. And here it is quite simple that a whole complex is assembled from sensors of the required accuracy and a stupid controller. By the way, I want to thank dihalt for the fact that he put up with my noob questions and advised in basic electronics. At the same time I want to share the method of making chemically inert electrodes. I have seen on Habré many times articles in which people create irrigation systems using a humidity sensor or other similar things. Usually use ready-made Chinese textolite plugs with copper tracks or just two wires. With this option, you are inevitably waiting for electrolysis and drainage of the wire material into the solution. Plus, the pH will fly completely unpredictable.
Actually, I suggest two things:

• Measurements should be carried out as short as possible. Do not keep contacts energized.
• Use "platinum for the poor" - graphite.

The source of graphite is most convenient to use rods for collet pencils. Immediately smooth and whole. I diligently picked out my first test samples from a traditional source - Ikeevsky pencils. Naturally, you can ask how to solder the copper wire to graphite. No It's impossible. But, there is the option of a good, durable mechanical contact, to which I came to practice:

How to break the Swede brain

It must be said that the mentality of the classical researcher from Russia is very different from the European approach. Especially from pedantic Swedes, with whom we work very closely. Apparently, many years of work in the conditions of lack of resources, equipment have done their job. Our man of sticks and electrical tape will collect even a stellarator, if very necessary. Therefore, often in order to test some hypothesis, all available means for the implementation of the plan are used.
One Friday evening, I was somehow unsubscribed by our Swedish colleague, a mathematician by education, but also engaged in the technical part of many projects. A person creates terrible things in GNU Octave, mocking data and getting beautiful pictures with graphs on the way out. We appreciate him very much for that. Actually, that's why I immediately tried to help him with his problem. The man planned to include an analysis of the absorption spectra in his studies in order to test his hypothesis. Unfortunately, the cost of the factory precision apparatus is very inhumane.
I understand tolerance in physics as part of my education and suggested that he use the following option:

• We take a diffraction grating in the form of a film with 1000 lines / mm for $ 4, such as this .
• We buy a jar of Pringles chips and solemnly eat
• We throw away the cover from the can
• In the bottom we cut a thin strip with a blade, a luminous flux will flow through it
• Glue the diffraction grating in the form of a film on the slot in the bottom. Now, when viewed from the side of the lid, we see a rainbow strip of light that has decayed into a spectrum.
• We put the resulting spectroscope on the suitable lens, focus and take pictures.

A colleague came to the conclusion that all Russians are slightly abnormal, but he rejoiced at the method.

Art courses

For a long time, dental silicone was my favorite material for lab DIY. I wrote about him before when I talked about the alternative use of dental materials. I'm also a fan of epoxy resins. Sometimes they are simply indispensable in the work.

A few months ago, I came across the same habr on the description of polycaprolactone in someone's comments. He began to dig information on the material - the polymer was very interesting thermoplastic. At a temperature of 65-80 degrees (depending on the purity and characteristics of the synthesis) turns into a plastic form. After cooling, it becomes firm and elastic again. Of the pleasant features - non-toxic, biodegradable, you can do without molds and molded like clay. Traditionally, not wanting to pay a mark-up in the form of customs fees and mark-ups, I turned to AliExpress. Immediately noticed a large variation in prices - the Chinese, as a rule, gave good discounts, but on large lots. I absolutely didn’t need a carriage of pellets, so I chose a relatively budget option in the region of 2,000 rubles per kilogram.
Came a hefty bag with polymer widths. The color was a suspicious dirty gray tint. After opening the room spread the delicate aroma of oil distillation products and even some kind of rubbish similar to benzene. I was wildly disappointed with the plastic, as it melted with difficulty in boiling water and instantly clutched back. It was impossible to sculpt. Nafig threw the remaining package, relying on his declared biodegradation, and safely returned to the usual silicone.
It so happened that while I was in Moscow for training, I came across a presentation by Russian distributors of polycaprolactone under the brand name Polymorphus. Actually, after wandering in the hell-hole of the subway, pretty rumpled, but not defeated, I went to some shopping center to feed a tired organism and get some rest. Stumbled upon a rack with plastic advertising for hobbies and creativity. After trying it in, I immediately noticed the difference between different Chinese factories. In the best traditions of comparison of industrial Chinese production and the underground factory of slaves of Uncle Liao Zi. First, the material was normal white. Secondly, there was no extraneous chemical smell, except for a barely perceptible something like paraffin. And most importantly, it normally melted in ordinary hot water. In short, I immediately bought a large jar in reserve. It turned out more expensive than ordering, but at least I will take advantage of this.
The material is supplied in cans of quite utilitarian coloring, similar to building mixtures or some kind of putty. However, the banks are quite convenient, only the dimensional spoons are missing in the kit. Banks, by the way, are made in Russia)


The algorithm for working with plastic is extremely simple - boil water and find a suitable container.


As soon as the granules of the polymer became transparent - the polymer completely passed into the plastic phase.



From this point on until cooling it is a version of transparent clay with which you can do anything.
It must be said that the material took root immediately in our laboratory. The widest application spectrum is to quickly repair an adapter, make a cable holder, make a spring support (yes, it springs well in the form of a spiral), mix it with a bactericidal powder and get anti-bacterial custom plugs / gags for different equipment and much more. Really surprised at the first work with him that it forms a normal thread, if you stick it tightly on the neck of the bottle. Moreover, such a "cork" is screwed and twisted after that. It can be drilled, but only with cooling, as it easily melts from heating. You can melt in a furnace or bend the desired area with a heat gun. In general, polycaprolactone really pleased. With it, we even made our rat Theodor a helmet, like Magneto’s for a number of experiments. The animal was perfectly tolerant of plastic elements and, in general, felt very positive.


Theodore is optimistic about the future before the start

PS
Remembering the reaction of the audience to designer Tanya from one of the past publications , I immediately want to please everyone that the girl is getting married in a few weeks and all the questions about her personal contacts - to her future husband)) Good holidays to all!