• interrobang@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    10 days ago

    I fix software on these things! No one ever quite gets what I do for work, it’s nice to run across in the wild.

    I feel seen lol

      • phdepressed@sh.itjust.works
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        10 days ago

        Top left is a thermal cycler. Basically it heats and cools samples at a given rate. This is primarily used for generic PCR, and certain enzymatic reactions. Top right is the fancier version of this, it is for qPCR, so it can do the heating and cooling and has a laser/detector for the dye or probe that reacts to generating more dna with each PCR cycle so you can quantify approximately how much of the target DNA you had.

        Bottom right is a luminex. This uses detection of fluorophore signals to measure multiple analyates, usually different proteins.

        Idk what bottom left is.

          • Rednax@lemmy.world
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            9 days ago

            Allow me to translate:

            Top left is a thermal cycler. Basically it heats and cools samples at a given rate. This is primarily used for magic. Top right is the fancier version of this, it is for qMagic, so it can do the heating and cooling and has a magic detector for magic components that reacts to magic happening so you can quantify approximately how much magic is going on in the beige box.

            Bottom right is a luminex. This uses detection of magic signals to measure magic.

            Bottom left is the beige box where magic happens.

        • runner_g@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          9 days ago

          Top left is the CFX96/384, which is also a qPCR instrument.

          Bottom left is the 3500 Genetic Analyzer, as someone identified. It’s used for sanger sequencing I believe. My last lab had one but I was never trained on it.

          • phdepressed@sh.itjust.works
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            9 days ago

            I thought it was just their T100, the CFX96s I’ve used don’t have the touchscreen but yeah the bigger “lid” does look like for the CFX.

            • runner_g@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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              9 days ago

              The bases and hot blocks are interchangable with that series. We recently upgraded to the Opus but our previous CFX96 had the T1000 touch base.

        • Fuck spez@sh.itjust.works
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          9 days ago

          I know nothing about this kind of lab equipment but Google says the bottom left device is a human DNA sequencer, ABI model 3500.

      • interrobang@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        10 days ago

        Some kinda lab work, maybe blood chem or urinalysis. I should clarify that since I’m a software person I don’t even know what they do, really, I just fix it when they stop transmitting lab test results to the database.

  • superkret@feddit.org
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    9 days ago

    You’ll need a PhD to be allowed to push the “on” button though.
    And then go back to the office to write grant applications for a month.
    To buy the next beige box.

  • allywilson@lemmy.ml
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    10 days ago

    This used to be IT in the early 2000s

    Beige as far as the eye could see (in a data centre)

  • fanbois [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    9 days ago

    We had a bright orange magic box that was connected to a beige windows 95 box that you were never allowed to turn off because nobody knew if it would survive a reboot and there was no software for the orange box for a more modern setup. Almost felt an like arcane ritual, typing in the command lines to get it to work.

      • psud@aussie.zone
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        3 days ago

        My workplace was still using DOS machines (386s) in 2015 to format letters. It couldn’t be emulated as the critical component was an ISA card

        One of the pieces of work I worked on was diverting the data stream aimed at that letter system and translating it to go via our more modern correspondence system

  • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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    8 days ago

    Science was cooler when you had to use a screwdriver.

    (This ad paid for by Demon Core Ltc.)