• Question: do u have a science lab or a room with science stuff to do your expairiments

    Asked by romi7890 to Lyn, Katy, Paul, PB, Ruth on 21 Jun 2013.
    • Photo: Peter Balfe

      Peter Balfe answered on 21 Jun 2013:

      I have several labs, with lots of people working away. In the USA you’re allowed to have your office actually in the lab itself, but in Europe the HSE don;t allow that, so I also have an office next door.

    • Photo: Ee Lyn Lim

      Ee Lyn Lim answered on 21 Jun 2013:

      If you have a look at my profile you can see pictures of my lab! I’ve got a little desk in an office, where there is a computer and books for me to work with. There is also a kettle, a fridge and a microwave for when we get hungry!

      Then there is the lab itself, which is where we do experiments. My lab is a huge room, I think as big as a basketball court and a half, where there are many ‘benches’ (that’s work counters) in rows where lots of scientists can work together. So even though my office only has 4 people in it, there are 20+ people working in the same big lab!

      There are also special rooms where you can do special experiments, like I show a picture of the tissue culture room. This is where we grow cells – we want them to be super clean – no bacteria growing in there, thank you very much! So we do all our work in those cabinets or hoods, which have fans in them to keep replacing dirty air with clean filtered air. We also have rooms where you do experiments with bacteria and viruses (so they don’t get out and infect other people), dark rooms to use microscopes in, and so on!

    • Photo: Katy Brown

      Katy Brown answered on 24 Jun 2013:

      Until very recently I worked in a lab – I have a desk there with pipettes and pipette tips to measure tiny amounts of liquid, bottles of chemicals, a centrifuge which spins things round and round very fast, a vortex – a machine which vibrates which is used to shake up chemicals and samples – and a heating block, to heat tubes to a certain temperature. This isn’t my lab, but it looks very similar:

      Now I work on a computer in an office with about 20 other PhD students, which is less exciting to look at, but I prefer it! My computer is normal but I use it to connect to a huge room full of very powerful computers, all connected together, which run things much quicker. It looks like this: .

    • Photo: Paul Waines

      Paul Waines answered on 25 Jun 2013:

      I have an office and a lab. Unfortunately they are at opposite ends of the university and so i do a lot of walking inbetween! If you look at my profile I have put a couple of pictures in there which might be of interest.

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