4 ms·

how far away is this from a 'two guys with the same name fucking around in a garage' (Apple mythical origin story) sort of setting? Like when can I be a mad sc

by Teever 4y ago

how far away is this from a 'two guys with the same name fucking around in a garage' (Apple mythical origin story) sort of setting? Like when can I be a mad scientist making irregular beating sheets of chicken heart muscle in my basement?

roughly 4y ago
There are a bunch of biohacker spaces around, and they’ll often run classes - small scale lab work isn’t actually that restrictive, cost or resource wise. Also, The Odin - https://www.the-odin.com/ https://www.the-odin.com/ - sells DIY kits and classes (and is just generally one of my favorite groups of weirdos)
twic 4y ago
You'd need: fresh fertilized chicken eggs lab gloves an egg incubator a dissecting microscope tissue culture dishes phosphate-buffered saline a pipette pump 10 ml pipettes two pairs of dissecting tweezers 70% ethanol solution kimwipes lab gloves a steady hand tissue culture medium (DMEM is fine) fetal calf serum penicillin-streptomycin mix a micropipette micropipette tips a tissue culture incubator a tank of carbon dioxide ideally, a laminar flow cabinet, but reasonably careful technique and the pen/strep would probably see you through So, when? Depends if you have Prime really. The thing is, growing sheets of cells is not a big step towards doing anything interesting. You need to do chemical and genetic manipulation of the cells, and that's the hard part.
nicd 4y ago
I think you could do that today? Incubating a cell culture is definitely possible. You can either purchase used lab equipment, or even build your own incubation chamber. I don't think OP's chicken heart experiment requires genetic tinkering, but even if it did, my understanding is that CRISPR is surprisingly accessible to hobbyists. For example, https://www.the-odin.com/diy-crispr-kit/ https://www.the-odin.com/diy-crispr-kit/.

4 ms·

how far away is this from a 'two guys with the same name fucking around in a garage' (Apple mythical origin story) sort of setting? Like when can I be a mad sc

by Teever 4y ago

roughly 4y ago
There are a bunch of biohacker spaces around, and they’ll often run classes - small scale lab work isn’t actually that restrictive, cost or resource wise. Also, The Odin - https://www.the-odin.com/ https://www.the-odin.com/ - sells DIY kits and classes (and is just generally one of my favorite groups of weirdos)
twic 4y ago
You'd need: fresh fertilized chicken eggs lab gloves an egg incubator a dissecting microscope tissue culture dishes phosphate-buffered saline a pipette pump 10 ml pipettes two pairs of dissecting tweezers 70% ethanol solution kimwipes lab gloves a steady hand tissue culture medium (DMEM is fine) fetal calf serum penicillin-streptomycin mix a micropipette micropipette tips a tissue culture incubator a tank of carbon dioxide ideally, a laminar flow cabinet, but reasonably careful technique and the pen/strep would probably see you through So, when? Depends if you have Prime really. The thing is, growing sheets of cells is not a big step towards doing anything interesting. You need to do chemical and genetic manipulation of the cells, and that's the hard part.
nicd 4y ago
I think you could do that today? Incubating a cell culture is definitely possible. You can either purchase used lab equipment, or even build your own incubation chamber. I don't think OP's chicken heart experiment requires genetic tinkering, but even if it did, my understanding is that CRISPR is surprisingly accessible to hobbyists. For example, https://www.the-odin.com/diy-crispr-kit/ https://www.the-odin.com/diy-crispr-kit/.