Testing out mk6 OD meter, preparing for upcoming microbii exp (in collab with @ATinyGreenCell ). Swapping out wires + commodity boards for custom circuit dramatically simplified things on my end. Mk7's already being polished for testing. Now to get some Julia growth curve notes running! #microbiology #amateurbiology

A little crowded, but with enough room to spin. For now testing calibration and zero point until the upcoming phage experiment. Really looking forward to the data from the little googly eyed friends. #phage #microbiology #hardware #amateurbiology

Going through some fascinating bits of phage data I've compiled so far. Clustering of target phage gene supports a guess we had in the beginning - there's a clearly delineated gene family that does not conform to host/genome cluster delineation. Hoping to confirm in wetlab soon.

#phage #microbiology #amateurbiology

Quick note & protocol on 3 year old Halobacteria culture sent out for sequencing last Friday. Results expected mid-March, hoping to publish in our biology zine Willowlands :

https://naturepoker.wordpress.com/2023/02/26/halobacteria-mutant-sequencing-3-years-in/

#sequencing #halobacteria #microbiology #evolutionarybiology #amateurbiology

I'll also write on budget breakdown for the long term experiment - the numbers ought to be interesting for any independent or amateur #biology practitioner.

Including all the hardware, electricity, media and full genome sequencing, it's coming out to about $10 USD a month. Most people would actually end up spending far less than that in similar studies.

I like this approach to #diybio #amateurbiology - low on spending, high on amount of thinking and reading needed.

Another wonderful example of early amateur scientist - pioneer of lab aquarium (1832) and a cephalopod researcher. It's saddening that these names are mostly forgotten and never discussed even within the amateur research community.

#biology #marinebiology #history #historyofscience #amateurbiology

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanne_Villepreux-Power

Welp- time for another one:

Submission open for our micro- #publication Willowlands.

Do you have an idea and a datapoint, in-between a lab note and a poster? Would you like to communicate it to the wider audience to build a real study, but still want it to be attributable and citable?

Willowlands might be for you. 2 pages maximum including figures. DOI assigned and archived. No other limitations!

http://binomicalabs.org/wrapping-up-2022-announcing-the-willowlands/

#academicchatter #diybio #amateurbiology #biology #microbiology

Our NCM 2022 poster and presentation on the usual lab note site- it also looks like the presentation video is on youtube now, for anyone interested "MinION outcome in amateur research: three genomes from 2018 to 2022" #nanopore #amateurbiology #poster

https://naturepoker.wordpress.com/2022/12/22/nanopore-community-meeting-2022/

Also - our #amateurbiology #ONT #nanopore lightning talk was on official ONT twitter account. Woot!

So - a salt marsh soil sample I collected with @ATinyGreenCell back in October (with goal of turning it into a winogradsky column) turned into this over the last couple of days. Salt concentration in it should be < ~60g/L. Any #microbiology people know what could be growing in there? #sampling #amateurbiology

#introduction
Hi Friends,
I'm an amateur biologist working in plant bioengineering, bespoke laboratory hardware design, and photobiology. If it eats starlight, I wanna know more. I'm an independent researcher at Binomica Labs along with @naturepoker , where we are trying to encourage a good research culture amongst fellow amateur biologists, and explore our living world using small thoughtful science.

#diybio #amateurbiology #homelab #bioengineering