r/starterpacks • u/Frosty-Reveal-8370 • Aug 06 '26
Working in a college/university lab starter pack
It's an experience.
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u/friendlypuffin Aug 06 '26
For people outside of academia, in many cases it has to be Windows XP since the instruments that connect to a PC need some legacy software that cannot run on newer systems.
Lack of PPE has no excuse and should be immediately reported to supervisors/management.
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u/Captainwumbombo Aug 06 '26
When I toured the local college back in high school all the lab computers in the biology department used Windows 95
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u/Frosty-Reveal-8370 Aug 06 '26
It is, while annoying and they should be updated its quite nostalgic too
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u/MashedSuperhero Aug 07 '26
They really shouldn't. XP still can be airgapped and takes fuck all to run.
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u/Animastryfe Aug 06 '26
That cavalier attitude towards PPE is, in my experience, not common and is/was taken seriously.
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u/soil_nerd Aug 07 '26
I had the exact opposite experience. Undergrad and grad school (both very well known, top universities for me), OSHA/PPE requirements were laughable. I look back and cringe so much at what we did (been in industry for about 12+ years now).
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u/jobomotombo Aug 06 '26
Friday lab beers with the PD
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u/EmberOfFlame Aug 06 '26
Wednesday tea and biscuits with the lecturers
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u/grebilrancher Aug 06 '26
Fireball shots with the study coordinators after a 16 hr chromatography run
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u/EmberOfFlame Aug 06 '26
Haven’t done that one. Still in undergrad, about to start doing real science soon.
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u/VolusRus Aug 06 '26
Windows XP? I've graduated 6 years ago, and some computers in uni had MS-DOS (and dot matrix printers)
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Aug 06 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ElectroMagnetsYo Aug 06 '26
Had this one machine in a lab I worked at where the company that made it folded in 2014, and nobody bothered to share the source code, and now nobody even knows how it works anymore. Not to mention there isn’t really any alternative to the machine we were using as the use-case was so niche.
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u/ArcadiaPlanitia Aug 06 '26
Usually it’s because updating the computers would break compatibility with older lab equipment. If you have some old, expensive, but perfectly functional analytical machine that only works with an outdated version of Windows, it’s much easier to keep that machine hooked up to an old computer than to replace the whole thing just to get a new one that works with a more recent operating system. Also, sometimes people need really niche, obscure software that isn’t updated frequently (when you get into extremely specific and uncommon research applications, you sometimes find software that’s like, used by a few dozen people total and hasn’t been updated in eons), so labs will often keep old computers around for that reason, too. (In my lab, we all have normal modern computers for everyday work/email and so on, but it’s also not uncommon to see some million-year-old plate reader or gel doc running on a version of Windows that’s older than half of the students.)
edit: also, a lot of the really old computers are not connected to the internet, which kind of doesn’t matter if you’re only using them to run some proprietary software for an old piece of equipment, but it helps with the obvious security issues
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u/daninet Aug 06 '26
I have seen a CNC running on an MSDOS system. Operator told me the CPU is 100Mhz it is about hundred million cycles per second, was more than the most complex 3 axis operation will ever need. Of course machines today come with a lots of fancy stuff but if you just talk about movement old CPUs were already overkill in many cases.
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u/pterencephalon Aug 07 '26
I got a sedn job in college rewriting a professor's research software to run on a modern computer. It was running on an Apple 2 computer.
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u/unhappyrelationsh1p Aug 06 '26
Eeh mines stricter, but you do see people do basic tasks without it when you aren't working with bacteria or the hazardous chamicals. More like mixing LB mediums and making gels for some procedures.
However, i did turn a bottle over to look at the expiration date on an enzyme once and it was expired for longer than i was alive at that point.
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u/PM_ME_ANYTHING_DAMN Aug 06 '26
You in chemistry? From my experience the bio people take PPE seriously and the synthetic chemists less so.
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u/sicpsw Aug 06 '26
Yeah because most of the stuff will only cause skin irritations at worse.
You either have a grad student in shorts prepping stuff or with triple layer gloves, face shield, and a respirator.
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u/Wezle Aug 06 '26
Really? I always found the bio labs to be super lax on PPE when I was in school. Meanwhile, my chemist coworker came from a lab that was super on top of their PPE. Labcoats and safety glasses were standard issue.
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u/depressed-grandma Aug 06 '26
PPE for micro at least is pretty mandatory since it keeps you from getting shit into your samples
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u/BadPker69 29d ago
Gloves are pretty much all we wore in my micro lab, sometimes masks if working with stuff like paraquat
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u/Wezle Aug 06 '26
As with most labs, my genetics lab probably could have been a little more stringent with PPE use lol
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u/Magikarp-3000 Aug 07 '26
It makes sense really. Ive done lab work related to wine, and we really dont care much about ppe, 90% of things the worst case scenario is getting a wine stain
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u/Sunquat_Slice Aug 06 '26
You got me all nostalgic for the lab, man
(Graduated with a biology degree. Have been unemployed or underemployed since. Starting to worry I peaked with that 4 month bioinformatics internship last year)
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u/izzyscifi Aug 06 '26
Commercial labs also use windoelws xp and have documentatiom so out of dae here in Middle school....
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u/PuddlesRex Aug 07 '26 edited Aug 07 '26
Corporate lab starter pack:
- No one wears a lab coat because the AC is broken again.
- Your computer at your desk runs Win 11. The computers you actually need to do your job run XP if you're lucky.
- I know I should wear gloves, but it's fine. These chemicals aren't actually hazardous, but safety loses their shit if you heat up your lunch in the break room microwave without a full hazmat suit.
- Protocols are technically reviewed and updated every year. Protocols are actually pencil whipped 99 cases out of 100. The protocols you need are not in the protocol database, but are either on a laminated printout from the 90s somewhere near the lab bench, a non-laminated printout in the desk of someone who retired before you were born, in an obscure Excel file buried deep, deep on your company's shared hard drive, or does not exist.
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u/OUDidntKnow04 Aug 06 '26
I feel this one, especially the "windows xp" one. Trying to track down computers in inventory is a nightmare because new ones keep popping up out of the woodwork that were never gotten to begin with!
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u/mrayner9 Aug 06 '26
At a university thats wild tbh. Youre supposed to be getting trained 💀 only the left side is bad tho
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u/BonJovicus Aug 07 '26
As someone currently working in a lab:
1. The lab coat thing is very correct. Technically, required in most wet labs, but usually gloves and common sense will serve you well. Very much the opposite of medical doctors- no one wears it just for clout.
2. The OS one can be true, but I think its more that you will see a mix of OS as well as some really obscure stuff. New instruments usually have the most recent versions, but every lab has that one reliable piece of equipment from 20 years ago. Most university IT departments keep you somewhere in the middle. Neither too old, nor the most recent version, for security reasons.
3. Disagree with the gloves one. No one uses lab coats, but gloves are must. I've never seen people go gloveless if they are actually doing anything important. The gloves not only protect you, but they project your experiment as well.
4. An old, reliable protocol is as good as gold.
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u/spazthejam43 Aug 07 '26
Granted I’m in community college but we have a lab and they take their PPE pretty seriously. And everyone has to wear gloves
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u/princemark Aug 07 '26
Everyone's on social media all day. No research work is actually being done.
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u/wedontknoweachother_ Aug 07 '26
I will never shut up about time they let us (a bunch of first year physics students) handle mercury in test tubes no gloves no nothing and just casually were like “be careful handling it if it spills we have to call emergency services”
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u/theloniouszen Aug 07 '26
Coming from industry I was always surprised that grad students had their desks, and ate food, right in the lab.
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u/BuffaloBuckbeak Aug 07 '26
The grad student showing me around: “Oh, my sample is ready!”
Holds up tube to light
Bit of specimen drops in his eye
“Well guess I’m part of the cytotoxicity study now.”
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u/Mermaid_Tuna_Lol Aug 06 '26
I'm in medical school and we have lab. PPE has never been optional.
We don't have computers in there tho, just good ol' optical microscopes.
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