Life Science Tools of the Trade

That is a real sleazy pick-up line for 2 AM/last call in a bar, but this didn’t happen in a bar. Nope, a somewhat questionable sales reptile dude tried to pick up a young woman (who shall go nameless) using that exact line and his camera cell phone as she asked about bulk discounts.  I guess you just don’t mention “bulk discounts” without the risk of getting a lonely sales rep a little too excited. She refused to sign a photo release, although he claimed it was so when he walked into the lab looking for her he knew who he was looking for. Perhaps he should just try and remember his customers name.

He didn’t ask if he could take my picture, and you can bet I didn’t ask for his.

I gotta get me one of them camera cell phones.

Vendor Show Food: cold fresh (Yes, I know that is an oxymoron) baked buns and room temp sliced meats. Cokes, condiments and free E. coli were also available. Are you hungry yet?

It was one of those days…  nothing in the lab worked.  Well, not consistently.    The pcr didn’t work the first time or the second time. Maybe, the third time is the charm but I didn’t hang around to run out the samples tonight.  Tomorrow will be soon enough…. success or failure.

In fairness, the pcr wasn’t a total bust.  10 out of 12 reactions worked the first time but unless all worked…  it was crap!  Set up the samples the second time, 8 out of 12 worked.  How the heck is that possible?  Instead of getting better, it gets worse!  That makes no, I mean absolutely, no sense.  At least if nothing had worked, I’d say it was my fault and that I had messed up the reactions.  Instead, I’m left shaking my head trying to figure out why some reactions worked and some didn’t.

Can’t wait until tomorrow morning…  what’s it going to be 5 out of 12?

Apparently G******* thought he saw thousands of Bic lighters held high as the longevity science fans begged for an encore.

So, I want to know.  Which of the companies that got a hold of my email address sold it to everyone out there?  I’m getting crappy email from every science related company out there.   Most of them,  I’ve never even heard of.  Sales reps wonder why I won’t give them any information?!?  Hum… I wonder….

As companies try to stay competitive, more and more kits are becoming commercially available. RNA isolation, DNA isolation, PCR optimization, protein purification, the list of kits just keeps getting longer and longer. As I order, kit after kit, the question I keep asking myself is this: are these kits helping or hurting science/research?

Now don’t get me wrong. I think kits are great and I use my share of them. BUT, and it’s a fairly big one, I’m finding that more kits are being utilized but that those using them don’t understand how or why they work. The kit gets ordered, the protocol is followed and then when it doesn’t work, the individual has no idea to troubleshoot what went wrong. There is little understanding in how the kit works or what the steps in the protocol are actually doing.

How can this lack of understanding be a good thing? Don’t you have to comprehend the basic techniques so that you can build on them? Is the vast array of kits that are available allowing scientists to be lazy? Obviously, I don’t have the answers.

I do wonder though… would science be better off without all the kits?

So here I am, at the University of Convicts, Australia.

And you know, one lab is pretty much the same as another, even across ten thousand miles. The same blue-capped bottles full of colourless liquid, the same fight for working Gilsons, the same overcrowding in the desperately iced-up freezers, the same reluctance to wear lab coats. . .

But we have a much better ordering system. There’s a Filemaker database associated with each grant: You fill in what you want and if there’s enough funds remaining you print it off and take it down to stores where the fairies collect it and process it. We can actually order stuff from Sigma (boo hiss) for ourselves, online. And when I wanted an iMac for my desk, Apple Australia (Education, natch) couldn’t be more helpful.

The only downside is that you have to collect your items from stores yourself when they arrive, and that’s five floors down. But hey, there’s a lift for the journey back up.

Now I’m off to find where my stuff has gone after the lab manager defrosted the freezer.

Everything has changed!

I couldn’t resist logging in to see if the bug had been fixed.

Microsoft OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers error ‘80004005′

[Microsoft][ODBC SQL Server Driver][DBNETLIB]SQL Server does not exist or access denied.

/forum/topic.asp, line 71

Nope.

Now at least the error message shows up on the home page so I guess that is an improvement! If you really want people to visit/post/etc. on the SAB site you REALLY need to get this problem worked out soon. I know my patience is fading…..fast.

Microsoft OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers error ‘80004005′[Microsoft][ODBC SQL Server Driver][DBNETLIB]SQL Server does not exist or access denied.

/forum/inc_functions.asp, line 1055

I’m know I’m getting tired of seeing this message when I try to access the “active topics”.

2525! Just checking to see if I can use the “Post Timestamp” to time travel.

Feel free to sing along.

Update: Okay the “Post Timestamp” didn’t work. I am tempted to “Post slug” whatever that means.

Two representatives from a major biotech supplier stopped by the lab to ask about our research and reagent use. I guess it was a trick question when they asked “Do you know _________  __________?”. Unfortunately I (honestly) replied, “Who the hell is _________ __________?”.   It turns out __________ _________” has been the sales rep for the last several years and the person asking the question was her boss.  I guess the question is “How do you expect to gain customers if you never stop by the lab (warning to any googlemeister sales reps-don’t immediately descend like flies on sherbert-I’m not that lonely)?” So if you are that “the lazy sales rep”, I hope you didn’t get fired.

Amazing! A vendor stopped by and asked us if we’d sample their gloves. She didn’t leave us a police evidence baggie with one O.J. glove but she actually gave us a box of 100 gloves to try. Unfortunately the large gloves were actually mediums and they forced my hand into an involuntary claw-like grip. In addition there was a nice web effect which might make these gloves ideal for speed swimming.

 A+ for effort

C+ for the product.