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We report a shipping container that enables a disruptive logistics for cytogenetic biodosimetry for radiation countermeasures through pre-processing cell culture during transportation. The container showed precise temperature control (

The need to understand signals given by our own body is of great interest to most human beings. This quest for self-knowledge is both shared by academic researchers and businesses who want to bring value to consumers in the society. This paper presents a story of how a software engineering researcher who collaborated with hardware engineers and entrepreneurs in an incubator, Simula Garage, hosted by Simula Research Laboratory to create a wearable startup called Sweetzpot. Sweetzpot developed a respiratory inductance plethysomography sensor called Flow to measure breathing signals from ribcage and/or abdominal movements. The team grew to consist of software engineers, students of machine learning and physics, an industrial/interaction designer, a hardware engineer, a lawyer, and an accountant in addition to external collaborators. We present the sequence of events that led to creation and sustainability of the startup and summarize the lessons learnt from it.

There is a need for accessible and low-cost microbiological water quality testing in contexts where diarrheal illness is a major public health concern. In most cases, the quantification of Escherichia coli and other microbial indicators by conventional culture methods requires an incubation step for processed samples at specific temperatures for bacterial growth over a prescribed time. However, incubators can be the most expensive equipment required for such microbial analyses, limiting the number and scope of water quality testing available in low-resource contexts. In this study, a low-cost incubator was developed using a locally available expanded polystyrene (EPS) foam cooler, with two water bottles filled with hot water to heat incubator to a target of 35 &deg, C. The EPS incubator performance was validated by processing 150 water samples in duplicates using the Colilert Quanti-tray/2000 system, incubated in either the EPS incubator or a standard laboratory incubator set at 35 &deg, C. Statistically significant correlations of results indicated that the quantification of E. coli was comparable between both methods. Risk categorizations from standard and EPS incubation results agreed for 141 of 150 (94%) samples, with zero false negatives. In addition to being reasonably mobile the EPS incubator would reduce the cost of such water quality testing, thus potentially increasing the scope of water quality testing coverage.

Malting is a process of controlled germination and early seedling growth. With appropriate control of grain moisture, environmental conditions, germination time, and kilning conditions, maltsters produce malt with the composition and enzymatic activity needed for brewing. In this study we compared protein mobilization in a widely grown malting barley variety germinated under controlled malting regimens and in a laboratory incubator not optimized for malting. Analysis of malts produced under three regimes showed differences in nitrogen mobilization and expression profiles of some proteinase genes. Many transcript probes changed in abundance during malting, with transcripts from the commercial malting and micromalting series trending similarly. Fewer transcripts showed differential expression between the laboratory germination series and the malting series that corresponded to protein mobilization differentials. Expression differentials that matched protein mobilization differences were seen for previously identified germination proteinases as well as those not previously linked to seed germination. These expression differentials suggest that several proteinases may serve previously unrecognized functions in protein mobilization during germination and early seed growth. Similarity of malting quality results and gene expression profiles in the two malting environments suggest that barley germination in an optimized micromalter is a suitable model system for barley germination in a commercial malting process.

Effective activation protocols that can be used during nuclear transfer investigations in goats need to be developed. We compared the development of IVF goat embryos with those of nonfertilized parthogenetically developing oocytes activated by treatment with either ionomycin or ethanol, both followed by immediate exposure to 6-diethylaminopurine (6-DMAP). Cumulus oocyte complexes (COCs) recovered from abattoir goat ovaries were either matured in a conventional laboratory incubator or placed in pre-equilibrated maturation medium and shipped overnight in a battery-operated dry incubator to another laboratory. Mature COCs were allocated randomly to one of three treatment groups. Group 1 oocytes (n=169 shipped, n=253 not shipped) were fertilized in vitro at 24 h postmaturation (hpm). The remaining COCs were activated at 28 hpm in either ionomycin (Group 2: n=362 shipped, n=202 not shipped), or ethanol (Group 3: n=263 shipped, n=249 not shipped). Activated oocytes were immediately incubated in 6-DMAP for 4 h. Blastocyst development was evaluated on Day 8 post-insemination/activation. Percent cleavage was comparable in shipped and nonshipped oocytes and in all treatment groups. In both shipped and nonshipped oocytes, parthenotes developing from ionomycin- and ethanol-activated oocytes had significantly greater blastocyst development (P

Methods of modeling and optimization are described for coil systems that produce magnetic fields of prescribed uniformity within a maximal volume, while minimizing stray fields. Two examples of application to biomedical research are analyzed in detail. One of them deals with animal exposure systems at 60 Hz within a confined space. The other considers exposure of cell cultures simultaneously to various strengths of magnetic fields (within a range of 1:10 000) in a single laboratory incubator. Design formulas and curves are provided; power supply systems for the coils and their computer control are also outlined.

Maintenance of stable pH is important for optimizing gamete and embryo culture. One method to stabilize pH entails using zwitterionic buffers in IVF handling media used outside the laboratory incubator. Current handling media utilize single buffers, such as MOPS or HEPES. However, the use of a single buffer limits the ability to adjust the range of buffering capacity. Furthermore, changes in temperature alter buffering of these compounds. Therefore, traditional IVF handling media utilizing a single buffer may not provide ideal pH buffering. This study reports that combining multiple buffers, such as HEPES, MOPS and DIPSO, into a single medium in various ratios gives the ability to shift the effective buffering range to cover a specific pH. Additionally, by combining various buffers, it is possible to expand pH buffering over a range of temperatures, while simultaneously reducing the absolute concentration of individual buffers, thereby reducing or alleviating toxicity concerns. This report verifies that DIPSO, MOPS and HEPES, and their combinations, support embryo development. Therefore, utilization of bi- and tri-buffered media, containing a mixture of HEPES, MOPS or DIPSO, offers advantages compared with media containing HEPES or MOPS alone, and may be used for procedures such as oocyte retrieval, intracytoplasmic sperm injection, embryo transfer and cryopreservation.

A significant demand exists for a liver support device such as a Bioartifical Liver (BAL) to treat patients experiencing acute liver failure. This descriptive paper outlines the design and development of two of the key components of the Mayo Spheroid Reservoir Bioartificial Liver (SRBAL) system. One of the components is the multifunctional Spheroid Reservoir and the other is Multi-shelf Rocker. The Spheroid Reservoir provides an environment to support the viability and functionality of the hepatocyte spheroids at very high cell densities. The Spheroid Reservoir is the biologically active component of this extracorporeal liver support device. Since the Spheroid Reservoir is designed to support 200-400 grams of hepatocyte spheroids, a method to quickly produce large quantities of spheroids is required. The Multi-Shelf Rocker fulfills the production requirement by allowing the culturing of up to six liters of hepatocyte suspension in a conventional laboratory incubator. The SRBAL is designed to provide life sustaining liver-like function to patients in acute liver failure.

An incubator is described which automatically simulates fluctuations of natural irradiance by coupling a photocell to a lightbank in the ship's laboratory. Design details are given.

Cultivation of animal cells for development of new therapeutic proteins has roudnely employed shaken flasks or roller bottles. In this study, cell cultures were successfully miniaturized in a microtiter plate format and protocols were devised to grow cells in universal 96 deep-well microplates with shaking. Cultivation of CHO DG44 cells expressing recombinant human protein 1 (rhPl) was shown to be equivalent to growth in shaken flasks with respect to rhPl titer and productivity, integral cell area, and metabolite profiles (e.g., lactate and ammonia). Adjustments to the culture volume in microplate wells were found necessary to provide adequate mixing of cell suspensions. Microplate work was expanded to include transformed human kidney cells (HEK293H) as well as AVI2 cells derived from Syrian hamster. Response surface methods were used to assess the similarity of results between vessel types. Shaken microplates served as acceptable substitutes for shaken flasks in all three of the cell lines based on response surface mapping of integral cell area or product titer. The potential of microplates as growth vessels for high throughput process development, media development, and clonal isolation/evaluation is remarkable ∔ 10,000 microplate wells can be used to grow cells in the same amount of laboratory incubator space that would normally beoccupied by only 160 flasks or roller bottles.

Accustomed though we are to advances in medical technology, a 24 October 1993 news report that human embryos had been cloned astonished many persons. A New York Times story, "Researcher Clones Embryos of Humans in Fertility Effort," was the feature that Sunday morning in many newspapers throughout the country. Media coverage continued for several days, with debates about cloning on editorial pages, Nightline, and Larry King Live. Within a week the issue had faded from media consciousness, aided in part by Time and Newsweek stories that stressed the huge gap between die reported research and the Jurassic Park-type fears of cloned human beings that initially spurred national coverage. Bioethicists and law makers, however, must still contend with the ethical and policy issues that even limited cloning of humans presents. Should researchers be free to continue cloning research? May infertile couples and their physicians employ cloning to form families? Or should government prevent cloning research or discourage some or all of its later applications? As with many biomedical developments, these questions present a mix of issues that need careful sorting. They involve, among others, questions of the propriety of embryo research, the validity of deliberately creating twins, and the importance of nature versus nurture in forming human beings. They also raise slippery slope concerns: should otherwise seemingly valid uses of a new technique be stopped to prevent later undesirable uses from occurring? To address those issues we must first describe the cloning research that has touched off the furor and the concerns that it presents. Two Types of Cloning The research that put cloning on the public agenda was a long way from Huxleyian fantasies of identical babies, mass produced in laboratories, and did not involve cloning as conventionally understood at all. To clone means to create a genetic copy or replica. Perhaps due to science fiction fantasies, it has been assumed that cloning would occur by removing the nucleus from the cell of one person, placing it in an egg that has had its nucleus removed, and then implanting it in a laboratory incubator or a woman who would bring to term a child with the identical genetic characteristics of the person providing the cell nucleus. Although this procedure has worked with frogs, it has never succeeded with mammals and appears highly unlikely to be accomplished in even the mid-range future. If this form of cloning were possible, scientists could fabricate as many copies as one wished of any available human genome, subject only to the limits of uterine or artificial gestation. A second and more limited way to create clones is to split the cells or blastomeres of an early multicelled embryo before the cells have begun to differentiate. Because each blastomere at this stage is in theory totipotent (that is, capable of producing an entire organism itself), die separated cells can become new embryos, all of which which have the same genome. This form of cloning is now practiced to some extent in the cattle industry. Cloning by blastomere separation is limited to the number of cells that can be separated before cell differentiation, which destroys totipotency, occurs. The study that generated the recent interest in cloning involved a small but essential step toward cloning human beings by embryo splitting. Researchers at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, D.C., separated cells or blastomeres from seventeen two- to eight-celled preembryos and showed that, to a limited extent, they would divide and grow in culture. The cells had been obtained from polyspermic embryos that had no chance of implanting in the uterus and that ordinarily would have been discarded. The separated blastomeres were coated with an artificial zona pellucida and placed in the culture medium used for in vitro fertilization (IVF). The researchers obtained forty-eight blastomeres from the seventeen polyspermic embryos (eight two-cell, two three-cell, five four-cell, and two eight-cell), or theoretically forty-eight new totipotent embryos. …

Black fly adults were permitted to engorge on known hosts then retained for varying periods of time in a controlled laboratory incubator or under field conditions. The blood source was identifiable in all instances by precipitin tests conducted on smears 24 hours after the blood had been imbibed. Seventy-four per cent of the meals from flies held in incubators and 60% from flies held outdoors were identifiable after 32 hours, but after 40– and 48–hour intervals few meals were identifiable. The hosts used were horses and guinea pigs. It is tentatively concluded from a comparison of data and from field- and incubator-held flies that temperature influences the rate of digestion.