Tag: equipment

Apr142011April 14, 2011April 14, 20114Commentsby L.

Test slides

Posted in Hardware, Tips

Let me tell you a little story.

The place is the CONFOCALMICROSCOPY listserv.
The time is 1997.

A query asks how to mount fluorescent beads from Molecular Probes in order to image them…

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Apr102011April 10, 2011April 10, 20110Commentby L.

Wireless

Posted in Hardware

I recently returned from my private island in the Maldives. Like most of the inhabited islands, it has no physical links…

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Dec202010December 20, 2010December 20, 20100Commentby L.

Open source orbital shaker

Posted in Hardware

This is a nicely done (and award-winning) orbital shaker. Orbital shakers can often cost on the order of $1500. This one can be custom built for about $150, with additional units costing about $60 (a single controller and power…

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Nov202010November 20, 2010November 20, 20101Commentby L.

Thorlabs scope building blocks

Posted in Hardware

At the SfN meeting in San Diego this year, I met Jeff Brooker from Thorlabs. Jeff and his team of about 17 people have a history of working together in industry on photonics. They have…

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Nov062010November 6, 2010November 6, 20105Commentsby L.

Cameras for ultra low light levels

Posted in Hardware

Many image sensors are built backwards, just like the retina. The actual photon detectors are buried behind a mesh of circuitry. Back-illuminated sensors, where the detectors are put in…

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Sep282010September 28, 2010September 27, 20104Commentsby L.

3D Printed Equipment from the DeRisi Lab

Posted in Hardware

The DiRisi Lab at UCSF shares their STL files for 3D printing some equipment. There’s a pipette holder, several gel combs, an objective case, and more. You can print your own with…

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Sep232010September 23, 2010September 23, 201017Commentsby L.

Building a 2-photon microscope

Posted in Hardware

Less than a year ago, the patent on 2-photon microscopy ran expired (Nov 14, 2009 pdf). So now anyone can sell a kit or system for two photon microscopy without having to pay a licensing fee.

If you don’t want to start from scratch, there are a lot of options.

Prairie Technologies

…

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Sep202010September 20, 2010September 20, 20105Commentsby L.

Lasers for multiphoton microscopy

Posted in Hardware

Coherent just sold its 1000th Chameleon system. That’s roughly how many of the similarly-priced Lamborghini Countach LP500s were sold. That was in the 1980s. Coherent has been selling Chameleons since…

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Sep152010September 15, 2010September 15, 20100Commentby L.

Outfitting a lab on the cheap

Posted in Hardware, Tips

A friend of mine does a lot of molecular biology and keeps an incubator at home so she can run a reaction and stop it some time at night without having to make a…

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