Are you trying to step forward with your research work in microbiology? An incubator shaker is one of the most crucial components to aid cell culturing, studies in solubility, and cell aeration. When you have this equipment, the diffusion of oxygen levels up and become available to the cells. The equipment maintains uniformity when distributing the nutrients and various growth elements.
Buying the incubator shaker may seem simple but you may end up with mistakes that may dampen the quality of your research. For instance, you may not have knowledge about variance of models, buy a cheaper version, and forget to check how fast the delivery time of the shaker is. Missing these crucial factors may impact the findings greatly.
So, run down through these ideas to know what you must consider when shopping for incubator shakers:
- Assess the requirements
What is your requirement in terms of litres of biomass, culture or other experiments you want to conduct for statistical analysis and screening? Next, you need to know how to grow the culture, that is the volume per flask, well, or tube. With these, you can easily determine the culture vessel capacities. Weight and space are two of the major things to note to know how many vessels they can hold.
Manufacturers list several shapes of vehicles and the capacity of each. Once you know which types of vessels suit your needs, you will have a good about what to buy. Based on the types of shakers, you may need to buy clamps and platforms separately. Are you keen to use different shapes of vessels? Try to get clamps and platforms that can be easily adjusted.
- Temperature requirements
The primary function of the incubator shaker is shaking the ingredients but it comes with an added functionality and that is temperature control. Typically, this functionality allows users watch the temperature range during shaking. A few units also have refrigeration for extremely low temperatures. To tailor heating and cooling samples, you need to explore if the incubator shaker comes with two different types of temperature controls. In the first one, temperature is controlled based on the room temperature and the other one is what is needed for the experiment.
- Placing the incubator shaker
One of the practical considerations when buying an incubator shaker is where you need to place it. You need to know where best to place it and buy suitable equipment. Do you want to place the incubator shaker on the ground floor or the stories above as that will influence your decision? You must choose a space with proper ventilation around the system. Apart from this, you must consider the space required for placing the external steam generators and gas cylinders to aid humidification. Furthermore, you need to have adequate space to open the incubation chamber door.
- What is the motive of culture?
What kind of organism needs to be cultured? It will impact your decision when buying the incubator shaker. For organisms like yeast and bacteria, the requirements are largely standard optimal temperature control. On the other hand, for cell culture of mammals and insects, the requirements are vastly different. They are more sensitive to stress and environmental conditions, and naturally more prone to contamination. Based on the motive of culture, you need to consider the shaking speed and throw, carbon dioxide control, range of temperature, humidification, and light.
- Usability of the system
How long will the incubator shaker retain its usability? Will it cater to decent laboratory practices? As far as usability of the incubator shaker is concerned, you must not miss the safety considerations and way of handling the equipment. Check the parameters here before buying the equipment:
- Easy handling
The equipment must be highly accessible for cleaning as you need to wipe the spills immediately after use. To reduce the difficulty of handling, you need to search special options to improve the result without the trouble of opening the chamber.
- Design considerations
The design of an incubator shaker needs to be such that you can access the shake flasks easily. Find out if you can get the opportunity to pull the tray for exchanging flasks without removing it fully. When it comes to a stacked system, make sure the users can access the top desk without requiring any other tool.
- Safety
Safety considerations are important for a majority of laboratory equipment. So, look for equipment that comes with the automatic tray locking feature. That way, you cannot begin the shaking process unless the tray is locked. Apart from this, check for auto-restart feature that comes to help when you forget to restart the shaking process.
So, you are aware of what the parameters are when buying an incubator shaker. Based on the precision of the setting, you can pick from digital or analog controls. A majority of units will have either of the two, but if you are ready to pay a good price, digital control will serve its purpose. For quality laboratory equipment used in optimizing cell culture growth, rely on I Gene Labserve. Stop at https://www.igenels.com/ to check the features of their industrial and research laboratory equipment.
FAQ
How to clean an incubator shaker?
To clean the incubator shaker, use mild soap and water ad for disinfection, stick to a solution containing about 70% alcohol and an ammonium based disinfectant.
What is the reason behind shaking of incubators?
To promote growth of cells in the laboratory, shaking helps in the distribution of nutrients and infusing oxygen into cell culture.
How to care for the shaker?
Use a damp cloth or a laboratory cleaner to wipe the outer surface of the shaker. Don’t use corrosive or abrasive cleaners to clean the equipment as it may damage the equipment and make the warranty non-functional.