Guest Blog: Lab Safety: Must We Learn from our Mistakes?

All chemists will agree that laboratory safety is the first priority when it comes to experimentation in the lab. Proper practice, lab safety equipment and supervision are necessities when working in the lab. Most of all, prior preparation will assure that an accident doesn’t take place. Looking at recent laboratory accidents and tragedies, it seems that chemists are still learning lab safety the hard way. By analyzing these students’ mistakes, many chemists can avoid these types of occurrences in the future.

Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/blogs/2013/05/lab-safety-must-we-learn-our-mistakes

Editor’s Corner: Greener 2013 or Not?

Researchers continue to uncover bits and pieces of our changing environment—an environment that’s changing because of human effects. Researchers at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, for example, have found that melt water from glaciers and ice sheets could be an unexpectedly large source of iron to the North Atlantic. The iron input from the glaciers, which is several magnitudes higher than previously found, can stimulate plankton growth during spring and summer since these organisms rely on iron as an essential nutrient. The researchers are unsure of the biogeochemical effects of this melt water discharge, but it is an added result of global warming.

Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/blogs/2013/04/greener-2013-or-not

Combining and Creating New Knowledge

Technologies continue to advance across a wide range of areas. Two that are particularly intriguing are space and computer technologies. Space technologies are intriguing because of the highly competitive and increasingly international nature. In an area mostly dominated in the past by U.S. and Russian spacecrafts and technologies, the space technology arena has become convoluted and integrated, especially with the retirement of the U.S. space shuttle and the rapid rise of the Chinese space industry. China and the U.S. each launched about 20 major spacecrafts in 2012, and both expect to do about the same in 2013. U.S. spacecrafts are launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla., Vandenberg AFB, Calif., Wallops Island, Va., the recently revived Sea Launch systems in the Pacific Ocean and several other smaller sites. China has three main spaceports and is building a fourth in Hainan. Russia has four main launch sites, Japan has two and seven other countries have their own as well.

Read complete article by Tim Studt here: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/blogs/2013/01/combining-and-creating-new-knowledge

Collaboration in the Information Age

Collaboration is, unfortunately, not as common as hoped for in the scientific community. Some researchers are quick to point out the detrimental effects, such as the difficulty young authors face in highlighting their work when they are four pages down on the author list, or the funding eligibility issues that may arise in such a partnership. The increase of scientific capability in non-traditional powerhouse countries, like China and Russia, raises additional concerns when it comes to data sharing. But like most things, there is a time and place for collaboration—and that’s in genomics.

We’ve lived in an “omics” age ever since the Human Genome Project (HGP) yielded the first human sequencing data more than a decade ago. In 2004, the last piece of the HGP puzzle was released, and that’s when our scientific landscape started shifting. With the advent of increasingly powerful computers, better software and enhanced methods, the “omics age” has given way to what is now being called the “information age” of genetics.

Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/blogs/2012/12/collaboration-information-age

The Government’s Role in Health and the Demonization of Vice

The question of the government’s role in personal health choices is tricky. What rights does the government have to protect Americans from themselves? Where does public safety cross a line and become nanny state? And does any of it work?

Read complete article by Lily Barback here: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/corner-The-Governments-Role-in-Health-and-the-Demonization-of-Vice-030512.aspx

National Chemistry Week During IYC 2011

This year is the 100th anniversary of Marie Curie winning the Nobel Prize in Chemistry and the 100th anniversary of the founding of the International Association of Chemical Societies. With such important anniversaries, 2011 has been dubbed the International Year of Chemistry (IYC 2011). The American Chemical Society (ACS) is paying tribute with interactive websites for everyone to enjoy.

Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/corner-National-Chemistry-Week-During-IYC-2011-101711.aspx

Moderation in All Soda (Editor’s Blog)

As we are told that certain foods are dangerous one moment and miracle foods the next perhaps it is time to take a step back and consider an alternative to panicking.

Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/corner-Moderation-in-All-Soda-091211.aspx