New Lab, need help - I need help setting up a new lab I just joined (Sep/10/2008 )

Hiya guys,


I just joined a brand new lab and have been asked to start setting it up and ordering all the necessary equipment--particularly the equipment necessary for our hood, as I will be doing a lot of cell culture work. However, I feel that I am a little out of my depth, as my previous lab experiences have been in labs that had long been set up. Unfortunately, my lab mates are both inorganic chemists, and they look to me as the biology "expert."

Particularly, I would appreciate if anybody could list all, or almost all, the equipment and materials that would be necessary for cell culture work.

So far, we have:
2 hoods
4 incubators
2 -20 deg. C refrigerators
2 +4 deg. C refrigerators
2 -80 deg. C refrigerators
1 empty tank for cryogenically freezing cells
some free samples from companies (2 small bags of pipets, some pipet tips, beakers, etc...)

Some things I have on order:

Microcentrifuge, refrigerated centrifuge, warm waterbath (I chose a 7 gallon one, Which I suspect might be too big for my purposes), pipettors, pipets (2ml, 5ml, 10ml, 25ml) and an inverted microscope.

We literally have nothing else but our benches so far. I would appreciate any suggestions you could give me on what I should order.

I'm anxious to get started as soon as possible, as I have to get 5-6 cell lines going by early to mid-October This from a completely empty lab!!!

Apologies for the long explanation,

--Buffonidae

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Just a few suggestions or comments;

Did you order some CO2 tanks for the incubators?

You will need holders for 15ml & 50ml conicals. May be a small vortexer for cell culture might be useful.

Did you screen for good FBS? You definitely have to do this before starting cell culture in a large scale.

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Scolix,

The incubators (and the hoods and refrigerators) were already set up when I arrived, so I don't know (my boss is away on a conference) if there are replacement CO2 tanks. How long do they usually last?

Racks for tubes (and for tubes themselves, for that matter) I'm about to order, as well as a small vortexer, shaker, and other equipment (I'm including a list of things I'm about to order below) I've got the big stuff down, I think, it's a lot of the small stuff (chemicals, reagents, and stuff like CO2 tanks) that I fear I'll miss and that will put me behind.

As far as media is concerned, we have trusted supplier, so it shouldn't be a problem.

Thank you for your suggestions; I'd love to hear more suggestions from anybody that's got them.

--Buffonidae

Things I'm planning to get:

Microcentrifuge, 15ml, 50ml tubes
Tube Racks and boxes
Shaker
Vortexer
hemoctyometer
Plates and Flasks
microscope
Gel Electrophoresis and Western Blotting apparatus
various media
Chemicals (Tris, glycine, SDS, edta, methonol, ethanol, tween, Trypan Blue, agarose)

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Our CO2 tanks last 1-2 months but many times there are emergencies and you are in desperate need for extra tanks. So we have 1-2 backup CO2 tanks.

One way to know if you are missing something is to go to another lab, which is probably next door and just walk through the lab and see if you have missed anything. Glance at their chemical shelf to get a list of some basic stuff.

Good luck !!!

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Thank you for the tips!

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OK, here are a few more things to consider.

There are some nice automatic CO2 switches on the market. You run lines from two tanks with regulators to the switch, then run an outlet line to the incubator. When a tank is empty the switch automatically cuts over to the other line. This allows you to replace the empty tank the cells losing their CO2-enriched environment.

How about that inverted scope - are you setting up for fluorescence imaging? Got camera mounts and fluorescence cubes (at least fluorescein and rhodamine cubes to start)? Then there's the camera.

Nitrogen dewar for storing cell lines?

A bottle of glycerin for lubrication can save broken glassware. First aid kit? I remember the day one of my students students shoved a broken glass pipet halfway through her hand...

Do you have access to a departmental autoclave? If not, there are some little movable floor units that can be very handy.

A recording thermomometer can be a nice troubleshooting tool.

I didn't see a pH meter and standards on the list. Talk about a critical troubleshooting tool! Some pH paper is nice to have on hand too.

Styrofoam containers for ice baths (or dry ice-acetone, etc.).

Torch for pipet pulling (if that's a fuel-oxygen torch you can patch or blow glass - got glassblowing glasses?). Diamond scribe and small triangular files for cutting glass tubing.

Well plate luminometer/spectrofluorometer/spectrometer (OK, this is maybe a bit enthusiastic for the setup stage).

General tool kit - screwdrivers, pliers (linemans, needle-nose, channelock), diagonal cutters, sheet metal shears, hacksaw, tiny hammer, 2.5 lb drilling hammer, electric drill and bits, C-clamps, socket set, crescent wrench, soldering iron & solder, volt-ohm meter, roll of insulated wire, wire stripper, trouble light, extension mirror.

Spare extension cords, power blocks, surge protectors.

Spill kit (a sack of vermiculite is good to have, along with a Costco box of baking soda)

Broom and dustpan (Naw, I'm sure you never break anything either)

There - have I spent the rest of your budget yet?

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small and medium gloves
paper towels
lots of bottles for stock solution
beakers
measuring cylinders
marker pens

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Jon Moulton,

I don't know about CO2 switches, and will have to discuss that with my boss. However, as we've got four incubators (or rather, 2 stackable ones), I think that in a pinch, I can move cells from one set of cells to the other incubator and hope no contamination occurs!

Regarding the microscope, one of our chemists will be attaching fluorophores to proteins, so we will need a fluorescent microscope. However, I would be using the inverted microscope just for observing cells, so I got the plain inexpensive (comparatively) model, saving the big bucks for the microscope, which would have broader applications.

We've got a dewar, and I'll put the pH meter on order. I hadn't thought of Vermiculite and Baking Soda for spills, so I'll set that on the (ever growing) list of things to be ordered. Regarding the thermometer, we got a cheap electronic one free from one of our suppliers, do you think that's good enough to just to test, say, a water bath or an incubator?

Thanks a lot for your advice!

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The advantage of the switch is that the switch operates before your cells spend time without their CO2. Otherwise you have to be periodically checking the gas bottles and wondering of it is time to swap. The switch takes care of the swap when it's needed without demanding your attention and then notifies you of the empty bottle (ours beeps an audio alarm after the swap until you reset the alarm by toggling a switch).

You could even run the output of the switch into a manifold (a few T connectors) and feed all four incubators off one switch.



That's probably fine. You might calibrate it against ice water and boiling water to be sure you have a reasonably accurate readout.

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Must not forget the weekends...unless your lab is manned 24-7.
Else you will have to learn to estimate if the supply of CO2 can hold on over the weekends and make rigorous checks on CO2 supply every Friday. A CO2 switch will save you the hassle and if your are careless the regret.

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