BioLab Manual
Safety
Please be aware that the substances you are working with maybe highly toxic. Consult Substance and Toxicity databases before if you are unfamiliar with the compounds with which you will be working.
No mouth pipetting
This is fairly self explanatory, and is also specifically mentioned in the regulations. (I presume due to some fairly horrific accidents)
No unlabelled containers
Unlabelled containers are a hazard, even if they are not hazardous.
It makes it difficult to keep the lab tidy if there are random concoctions cluttering the shelves.
Please label with the following;
- nick
- date
- contents
and if you are going to be leaving something hazardous or plan to leave an experiment running for an extended duration, please mail the list.
Protocols
Instructions for making general stock solutions
For more extensive databases of protocols:
Established Protocols
The protocols we have got working in the Biohackspace:
- DNA extraction using Chelex 100
- DNA extraction and precipitation with ethanol / isopropanol
- Make and run an agarose gel
- Growing Escherichia coli
- Growing Vibrio fischeri (our first attempt)
- PCR
Untested Protocols
The protocols we would like to get working in the Biohackspace.
Media Recipes
Equipment
To create a page for a piece of lab equipment fill out this form and make sure you put "Biohacking" as the subcategory.
We also have an array of glassware and consumables.
This site has a directory of service engineers for various biomedical/biochemical equipment:
http://www.labwrench.com/?equipment.requestAQuote/categoryNo/707/Mass-Spectrometers/
Strains
Reagents
The reagents we currently have stocked:
| Reagent | Brand | Location |
|---|---|---|
| Bacto Agar | Shelves | |
| Bacto Yeast Extract | Shelves | |
| LB broth powder | Shelves | |
| TBE buffer x10 | Shelves | |
| Sodium Acetate | Shelves | |
| Ethidium Bromide | Drawers | |
| Tri-Sodium Citrate-2 Water | Shelves | |
| Magnesium Chloride | Shelves | |
| Calcium Chloride | Shelves | |
| Agarose | Shelves | |
| Glycerin | Shelves | |
| Ampicillin Sodium Salt (powdered) | Fridge | |
| Kanamycin Sulphate (powdered) | Fridge | |
| IPTG | Freezer | |
| Proteinase K 1mg/ml | Freezer |
| Reagent | Description | Brand |
|---|---|---|
| pUC19 control DNA | NEB #N3041A | NEB |
| Q5 Hi-GC enhancer | 5x concentrate | NEB |
| Reagent | Cutting Site | Brand |
|---|
See also: Project:Making our own reagents
link to shopping list G spreadsheet
Suppliers
- Sigma-Aldrich - Good for custom primers
- Cole-Parmer
- Farnell
- Chang bioscience - pipettes
- NBSBio - Good for ladders and cheap agarose (only low concentration) NB: Be sure to navigate to http://www.nbsbio.co.uk NOT http://nbsbio.co.uk, or their payment system doesn't work. Weird. Standard shipping cost is £15
- Web scientific - Taq and ladder
- New England Biolabs They sell very cheap taq. We could also look at their restriction enzymes. However atm they won't sell to us as they only sell to universities or registered biolabs. See this post and this post. Once we have all our registrations for LBL sorted we could try again.
- Thermoscientific - Recommended for good value restriction enzymes. Not tried yet.
- VWR - Big supplier of chemicals, glassware and various lab stuff. Sounds very positive about selling to the hackspace.
- Invitrogen We failed their due diligence check. See post here and here. They have cheap TBE.
- IDT - possible source for primers. Haven't tried them yet.
- cheaplabstuff (ebay) - Cheap 1.5ml and 15ml tubes in small quantities. Also pasteur pipettes.
- microsupplies (ebay) - Cheap 5-200ul and 100-1000ul tips by the 1000
- Cambridge Bioscience - Not yet used, may supply GelRed or GelGreen (enquiry by Bene)
Also see general hackspace suppliers page.
