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Yes – easily!

14 January 2026
Tags: AI LLMs word count tokens lay summary counting words

When AI confidently cannot count to 300

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When theory overrides data

7 January 2026
Tags: peer review experimental data theoretical objections editorial standards research integrity data interpretation editorial oversight

How the criticism of one figure out of six became grounds for rejecting an entire manuscript as 'artifactual'.

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Happy New Year!

31 December 2025
Tags: research accepted publication happy new year

Exciting news at the end of the year.

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Merry Christmas

24 December 2025
Tags: Christmas wishes happy new year Christmas break

When the lights stay on a little longer.

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When students take "Cut and Paste" too literally

17 December 2025
Tags: molecular biology fail student error academic life science comedy lab practical

Why even today students need to experience work in a lab, and not in a virtual reality environment

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The art and science of freezing bacteria

10 December 2025
Tags: cryo storage storing bacterial stocks cryoprotectants correct freezing procedure for bacterial stocks parameters for freeing bacterial stocks

Bacterial cryo-storage in some detail

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Microbiology practical 2025

3 December 2025
Tags: lab mishaps laboratory techniques science humour lab comedy STEM education Teaching Stories

First year students in the microbiology lab

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On narrow minds and broad science

26 November 2025
Tags: Model organisms E. coli Fundamental biology Comparative genomics Scientific echo chambers Bacterial models

In defense of model organisms such as E. coli

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Oh dear, Liebherr, what have you done?

19 November 2025
Tags: refridgeration Liebherr failing fridge liebherr mediline Liebherr freezer problems Laboratory equipment failures

Liebherr Mediline: a pattern of failure

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Xencelabs Quick Keys

12 November 2025
Tags: programmable shortcut keys Xencelabs Quick Keys OLED shortcut display graphics tablet ergonomics reduce neck strain

An excellent workspace companion.

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"In It Goes!"

5 November 2025
Tags: student error supervision ligation funny student mistake

Ethanol precipitation of a 10 L ligation reaction

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Freezer physics: when flexibility fights stability

29 October 2025
Tags: freezer freezer layout temperature monitoring temperature stability

More freezer intricacies

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A robust and compact mini cycler

22 October 2025
Tags: PCR thermal cycler small footprint fast cycler

Benchmark TC-32 Mini thermal cycler: A compact solution for the lab

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New ways to navigate the literature landscape

15 October 2025
Tags: literature search productivity self-citations literature maps

A way to visualise connections between papers

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Cells don't care about your pomodoro timer

8 October 2025
Tags: time management pomodoro technique fail reality of experimental work

All those time management gurus should spend time in a research lab with active experiments

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The Scite.ai browser plugin: a free tool for citation context

1 October 2025
Tags: AI publications Scite.ai publication details

Some useful additional publication details

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Why, Fisher, why?

25 September 2025
Tags: microscopy Gene Frames time-lapse microscopy fluorescence microscopy

An ode to the discontinued Gene Frames

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Dispensing with the Brand Transferpette

17 September 2025
Tags: microvolume pipettes single channel multi volume pipette antibiotic streak test liquid handling

A tale of P1vir transductions and battery woes

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Dance of Destruction: A PAT testing adventure

9 September 2025
Tags: electrical safety PAT testing failing fridge refridgeration

In the grand theater of bureaucratic safety, the show must always go on.

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Paper Wizard - between mediocracy and gold

3 September 2025
Tags: paper wizard manuscript review AI manuscript evaluation publications publication review publication review AI

A tale of two papers and one overzealous AI

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Loss of a perfect pipetting aid

27 August 2025
Tags: M-Sarpette Peleus ball pipetting aid liquid handling

Liquid handling: less is more!

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Another Liebherr freezer bites the dust

12 August 2025
Tags: freezer liebherr temperature monitoring electrical fault

The "quality" of the Mediline

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Glycerol – the Halloween edition

1 August 2025
Tags: chemical suppliers Merck quality control orange glycerol

When glycerol looks like a radioactive sunset

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ChatGPT having a stroke

31 July 2025
Tags: GenAI AI hallucinating always check sources

When AI hallucinates: a cautionary tale

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The reality of freezer performance during power outages: empirical equipment data

30 July 2025
Tags: freezer failure temperature probe sample preservation

How much does the freezer temperature rise during a 2-hour power cut?

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FileMaker Pro: A Masterclass in Customer Service

29 July 2025
Tags: FileMaker Pro bad customer experience bad salesmanship

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Paying Twice

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pE-4000 by CoolLED

14 March 2020
Tags: microscopy light sources fluorescence microscopy

Switching from metal halide to LED was a very good move for us.

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Hamamatsu ORCA-Flash4.0

11 March 2020
Tags: microscopy imaging microscope cameras Hamamatsu

A significant improvement for the imaging quality of our fluorescence microscopy applications.

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The "national shortage" of M9 medium

31 January 2020
Tags: M9 minimal medium powder BD

Enigmatic shortage of 5 × M9 minimal medium powder

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Environmental chamber for time-lapse microscopy

20 November 2019
Tags: microscopy heated chamber environmental chamber time-lapse microscopy

Keeping bugs happy under the microscope.

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Temperature monitoring of freezers

1 November 2019
Tags: temperature freezer strains storage

Monitoring temperatures in your strain collection freezer was never easier.

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Manual microvolume pipettes

25 October 2019
Tags: automatic pipettes micro-volume Gilson IKA

Getting automatic pipettes just right is surprisingly tricky.

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Following growth of E. coli cultures

24 October 2019
Tags: spectroscopy growth curves Escherichia coli E. coli OD600

It took a bit of time to measure the OD of E. coli cultures in a non-invasive way, but we got there in the end.

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Micro-volume spectroscopy of DNA samples

23 October 2019
Tags: micro-volume spectroscopy bio-drop

Measuring DNA concentrations in small volumes.

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Mini centrifuges

10 October 2019
Tags: centrifugation centrifuges spinning mini centrifuges

Who needs mini centrifuges? As it turns out: everyone.

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Mixing samples

7 August 2019
Tags: mixing samples vortex

Especially when lots of dilution series are a regular part of the lab work the use of a good vortex mixer makes life a lot easier.

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