All Your Thermal Cycler are belong to Madeline

[zdashamber]

At this very moment I have claimed every single PCR machine in I know about. Running 8 PCRs in 11 machines... One of the old traditional machines from the first expansion was claimed by Kahn after I turned it on to heat up, but I broke entirely new territory in the Human Genetics Lab, where this Friday it was dark and unguarded... Oh, and I'm also not using the radioactive thermal cycler. Whaddya know, slap some "Caution Radioactive Materials" tape on a thing and put it near a ticking geiger counter, and suddenly it's a far less appealing target. But everything else: Mine. First time ever. Why? Because it's fucking gruelling to do this much PCR. "Oh, yah, lifting the 9 oz pipetter and pushing the plunger..." Bah! Picking out the exact well of the 96 that has the correct DNA... Carefully not cross-contaminating... Not dropping the multichannel pipetter... ...Ok, not dropping it again... Locating the plate of fifty randomly-assorted plates... Noting that the caps haven't been jammed on with great force, and having to do it at the thermal cycler without the cap-squisher, using the thumb Ow...

Thousands! Thousands of wells of PCR! Well, ok, only 594. Recharges to a bit more than $2000 of work today. I need to raise my rates. I haven't had lunch! I've been working for four hours without pause except twice to refuel on intensely sugared coffee! In fact, this has not been much fun. Only the thought of incoherently ranting on my LJ sustained me.

I still have to make, pour, and run 594 cells worth of gel... ::snEEfle::

Heh.

Comments

[kittentikka.livejournal.com]

I get what you're doing, but what does PCR stand for?

Too lazy to Google, too young to die.

[zdashamber.livejournal.com]

Polymerase Chain Reaction. Wherein two primers amplify thousands of copies of a certain length of DNA, if that specific DNA is found in the genome. Thousands of copies of DNA of a certain length that make a glowing band on a carcinogenic gel!

[motleypolitico.livejournal.com]

Oh, come now. The polyacrylamide gel isn't really all that carcinogenic. Acrylamide isn't all that good for you, I'll admit, but it's the ethidium bromide stain that's the nasty stuff! Or are you using propinium iodide? It's been, well, a few years since I ran gels and I'm trying to resurrect old knowledge. PCR was still pretty new when I was doing it.

[zdashamber.livejournal.com]

You want EtBr? I got a vial of ethidium bromide right here. Melt low-eleution agarose in microwave, stir to lower temperature and reduce chance of breating vaporized ethidium bromide, remove stir bar and pipette in Et!Br!, swirl and pour, rinse out flasks (splashing on sleeves of labcoat)... Move gel around with gloved hands later... I got a bucket o' carcinogens. Woo! :D

[ameer-tavakoli.livejournal.com]

When people can no longer possess buckets of carcinogens, the terrorists win.