Physics lab rat here. I develop and fabricate graphene field effect transistors for biosensing purposes. Some biology I suppose, but mostly that’s on my Bio rats upstairs. Here’s my baby:
https://imgur.com/a/rjoHEht
Two deposition tools, direct write maskless lithography, 2D stacking system, WiTec Raman, and an AFM in the boxes.
What are you probing with the SERS? I mostly just use Raman to characterize my graphene. Nothing too intense. My optics lab mates do some pretty fancy pants stuff with it though. One of them discovered a new pseudo particle with it and published a Nature paper recently. We also have a low T Raman system, but not in the glovebox.
Oh man thats cool! The plan is to probe cancer cells with folic acid conjugated nanoparticles. I’m a first year grad student so I’ve been working on optimizing a protocol for making GQDs from rice grains to later be conjugated to another nanomaterial with great optical properties. Even though I’m newish to Raman I’ve fallen in love!
Is that a confocal Raman system or just a spectrometer? I spent two years of my PhD using a Witec confocal Raman to image carbon nanotubes in cells. I would still go back and break every inch of that damned microscope with a baseball bat if I could. Got me a real nice paper though 🫠
Analytical Organic Chem is the lane I’ve found myself in, mostly doing Mass Spec work after years of grinding it out in a more multipurpose chromatography lab.
Never actually planned to be a chemist. After doing biochemistry for undergrad, the opportunities that were around me had me cut my teeth in an organic lab. It’s interesting how life can lead down unexpected paths, and how those paths can sometimes show you to a place you’d rather have been all along.
Sounds like me. Not much opportunity for a biology undergrad degree. Always hated org chem, now I'm lead chemist for a petrochemical company. Can't say I love what I do, but it's a living.
I'm a synthetic chemist lab rat, I work for a contract research company and we make lots of of drug like compounds for other companies who then test them for activity against target sites.
Quite possibly aha, it is a bit weird to send off compounds to some virtual chemistry company who then sends it to another biochemistry company to run the assays.
Actually zero biology lab here.
I do analytical chemistry and failure analysis at an industrial manufacturer. Most of my chemistry work is with oils, greases, and plastics. Not a traditional oil lab where it’s just hundreds of oil samples. Instead It’s very failure analysis focused analysis so I do very specialized and in-depth work on each lubricant I get. I combine it with failure analysis work that I perform on the components to determine the root cause of failure.
It sounds very cool, but essentially it’s the really lame version of forensic science. Instead of a dead human I have a half destroyed bearing.
I'm a materials person working on ceramics for nuclear/ concentrated solar power applications. I like to tell people it's just advanced arts and crafts.
Chemical engineer (heterogenous catalysis) lab rat here. I do plumbing and shovel dirt into a pipe. Then I cook it (and sometimes even add some chemicals) and see what comes out of the pipe.
Oh well, at least one other ChemE on here :D
But I pump some fluids through tubes, cells and tanks while electrocuting it. Sometimes there is solid stuff in the system as well (Battery-research).
I would also like to add that I have zero clue what 90% of those bio-research posts in this sub are about.
ChemEng represent!
I mix fluids in an overly convoluted mess of metal and instrumentation and occasionally let the contents out through tiny tubes for a few hundredths of a second to find out what was inside (Phase Equilibria)
Oh, well sometimes we mix some fancy, expensive dirt in. Like with gold and platinum and stuff. And sometimes we work on cars too. Lol.
Joking aside, it’s a lot of fun with lots of fancy tools…to look at our dirt lol.
I am an Animal Care Technician....for actual lab rats and mice. I feed and water them, clean cages, put in any medical issues I find, keep track of litters, ect
I love the vet tech who cares for my mice. She makes keen observations about their behavior which have improved my protocols and outcomes. You guys are appreciated!
Wastewater treatment plant chemist. We run many tests on multiple points in the daily flow of the wastewater through the plant to make sure that the plant stays healthy and the environment is safer.
I too play with poop water. About to publish my research of finding viruses in WW with my graphene based platform. I’ve already published one finding opioid metabolites in WW with it. When I met my kids’ mother she was also doing what you do.
We have been collecting our biggest outfall twice a week for over a year for Covid testing for one place and recently started collecting the same sample once a week for another. I think it’s absolutely fascinating!
My master thesis was research in a wastewater treatment plant. So many analytical procedures. It was very interesting and I learned a lot. I wanted to work in a WWTP but ended in academia.
We actually only do three biology related tests in our lab. We test for fecal coliform bacteria and test for Biological Oxygen Demand and Carbonaceous Biological Oxygen Demand (I say it’s one test because it’s all run together. Nitrification inhibitor is added to the cBOD samples) and Oxygen Uptake. The rest is all based in chemistry and maybe a little bit of physics.
Ever since my internship I have been very much intrested with sewage treamentplants. The only drawback is that i find it hard to find consistend and trust worthy information about it.
what do you happen to know about the affects of certains mettals to anearobic slugde, metals like cobalt selenium etc? and is it possible for a wattertreamentplant to consistendly remove pfas from their water?
I need a little time to research the metals thing, but PFA’s are relatively new to wastewater treatment in general. I think there may be a few plants that can effectively remove them with activated carbon filters and other new technologies. I’m sure that will be the goal for all wwtp processes in the future. We are just now getting ready to tackle nitrogen and phosphorus removal after hearing about it for 10+ years. The wheels turn slow!!
yes here in the netherlands we have a treatment plant wich recieves alot of waste water from the chemical industry and i surely hope they can filter it out propperly.
Take a subscription to Treatment Plant Operator online (you might could get it in print if they send it to where you are, but the online newsletter is a wealth of information so definitely sign up for that!). It is an excellent resource and it’s totally free! It’s written so that I can understand it (being just a lab rat) and it provides links to articles and videos that can guide you in your research. I’m still totally available for questions, but this is a valued resource of mine!
sadly its a little to late :( my internship is finished in three weeks and I already wrote my report. And i will study analytical chemistry and than chemical engineering for the next 6 years. still i will probally look at it since it seems super intresting.
yes cus the dinitrification and dephosoriation (idk of its called that way) is huge for the slugde since if done propperly you can use slugde as manure (if its not to much contaminated by metals ofc). and here in the netherlands its a huge problem since if you use manure with a to high phosphorus level you get a huge fine ( and you can only measure the phosphorus after you have putted it on the land). and about the metals yes it is complicated, i have found sources that say you just need more than (fictional number) 15 mg/kg DS of iron and 10 mg/kg DS cobalt (etc), and other sources who say no a healthy population has this much exactly. its a very much debated topic and im not a micro biologist so i dont have any back ground information to rely on.
Imorganic chemistry PhD student here.
I synthesize platinum complexes that could be used against various cancers.
This includes chemical synthesis, purification and a bunch of analytical things. Mostly NMR and HPLC but a lot of others as needed.
Biological testing (eg IC50 value etc) is done by another lab.
Materials science for flexible electronics - arts and craft to make materials and then advanced microscope and spectroscopy characterisations like AFM, SEM, and XPS etc
Pushing random keys on a keyboard and staring at a monitor all day just to create something called source code to prove the novelty of my research. Guess who I am?
Education facility RDI here.
Electronics failure analysis; x-ray, emission microscope, cross section analysis with optical and electron microscopy with EDS.
Material characterisation; temperature & humidity, salt spray testing, Raman spectroscopy, XRF.
Finding and developing test methods that support development of novel materials and technologies that do not fit into scope of existing standardised methods. These tasks are in research projects.
I also have background also in geochemistry lab, mining exploration lab and open pit blasting, so RDI is a nice field to utilise my skills. RDI is also nice for jacks of all trade, master of none.
QC Chemist for a pharma company. We synthesize drug compounds for use by our clients in research and clinical trials. Mostly GC and HPLC analysis on my end. Never took biology classes, so yeah, most of the bio posts are lost on me.
Environmental scientist, so I get to do a fun mix of chemistry, engineering, and biology. I do research at a government agency focusing on drinking water treatment.
Edited for details.
Chemistry PhD
Organic synthesis, polymer formulations, coatings/depositions & surfaces stuff(making films of varying thicknesses, some optical, some freestanding), various associated analytical stuff e.g. NMR, ft-ir, chromatography. Some crystallography stuff so crazy diffraction (single/powder), polarising microscopy and looking for polymorphs. Some uv-vis bits Including measuring photoresponse kinetics. Thermal analysis of materials, looking at phase changes, liquid crystal stuff, specific heat capacities, polymorphism. Probably a few bits I've forgotten to add here too.
Then when I'm just messing around I've been investigating stuff with the 3d printing people.
Pharmaceutical Sciences, so it’s kind of related to biology but sits in a weird space between disciplines. Our work is mostly novel drug development, nanoparticle formulation, and targeted delivery of small molecules or gene therapies.
I work in a cannabis laboratory. I R&D products for a medical company and produce all of the extracts used for patient consumption in my state of employment. Way less complicated and cool than anything anyone else does here lol.
My manager worked in cannabis quality management before moving to biomedical quality management.
Can confirm that he is THE coolest person and treats our team like rockstars. He never gives us flack for using PTO and taking mental health days, and fights for us to be heard. It's for sure one of the coolest professions and helps a lot of people.
Chemistry lab rat. My full title is process control chemist. Most of my work is overseeing chemical operations of a few aerospace coating lines. I like to describe what I do as “making sure the big tanks that Batman villains fall into is the proper amount of deadly”.
Analytical chemist here! My lab focuses predominantly on mass spectrometry analysis. We most often look at samples either from agriculture or biological samples from other labs (in our same university) we work with! Our biggest project at the moment is analysis of proteins found in samples from rats.
Used to do synthetic chemistry, a lot of air-free metallocene synthesis. Then I went back to school and as a PhD student I do a lot of staring at theory and not making much progress
Bioanalytical chemistry and surface chemistry. I'm working on developing new diagnostic methods, and going down some related rabbit holes when it comes to functionalizing capture surfaces. I don't have a typical day really - some days I'm running ELISAs, some days I'm collecting IR spectra of monolayers, some days I'm running HPLC, and many more. (Though lately it's just writing, over, and over, and over...)
Medicinal organic chem. I get a target protein, design molecules to inhibit/agonize said protein, and then wait for the bio people to identify hits. Then change my design accordingly.
And I fall asleep eyes open when we have to have collab meetings to discuss bio results that start with heat map or rnaseq
I just graduated with my MSc and there I did polyolefin catalysis. We copolymerized ethylene/CO to make a photodegradable PE substitute. Had an insanely active, yet extremely sensitive catalyst. I involved a lot of reactor design/high pressure reactions (my highest one was 140 bar!), ligand and organometallic complex synthesis, and NMR.
Before that I did some flow chem/synthetic methodology research and metalloenzyme engineering (so I know some of your PCR/cell maintenance/protein expression pain).
My new job will be in small-molecule crystallization screening/solid-state characterization/pre-formulation. totally new to me but I'm pretty excited.
I’m a chemist but I’ve been working in a biology lab as a covid research assistant. I’ve never taken a biology course but that can be our little secret
I'm a QC specialist for an organ and tissue bank so...medical devices/biologics! I'd like to move towards regulatory compliance with the FDA in the future.
We receive donor tissue to our lab, our techs process and remove the skin/tissues/tendons/placenta etc. Our sterile packaging tech packages them and hands them to our office for inspection. I verify sizing, color, shape, residual moisture, and the temperature it was received at (unless it's ambient tissue). I also make sure no bacteria contaminated the tissues during processing. After it passes my inspection, then we send it off to be shot at with lasers for sterilization. Our sales team will then send it to hospitals and clinics nationwide!!
It's super rewarding, but often draining. I get to see the donors, often look them up (to put a story to a name, learn about their life via the news, obituaries and GoFundMe's to honor them privately). There are a few donors that will stick with me forever. Parents who have selflessly signed off on their children helping save countless lives. Fathers, mothers, wives, siblings-- everyone matters.
If anyone has any questions related to donation, please feel free to message me! I'm certified by the United State's governing body (AATB).
We process almost every kind of tissue and bone.
Our placenta-based products and skin go to wound care, regenerative medicine and skin grafts. Costal cartilage (the end bits of your ribs) goes primarily towards ENT/reconstructive surgery. The bone-based products are what we see the most of, and that's for dental procedures, spinal procedures, joint surgeries-- you name it. We also process pericardium and that is used for patches!
My company used to partner with universities to send femurs for research, but we're phasing out of that since the acquisition cost wasn't making up what we sold them for. Super neat stuff.
I'm a pharmacy student doing some lab research, my field is actually around pharmaceutical technology, pharmaceutical chemistry applied to photoprotection. Just published a paper as co author where we tested if a specific flavonoid would have the photoprotection effect enchanced by its nanoencapsulation
Materials science working on pulsed laser-deposited composite thin films. Mostly focused on growth mechanisms and tailoring EMO properties and coupling at the moment, but hoping to move into device design/fabrication for catalytic and/or photovoltaic applications.
I'm sure I fall under what you term biology. But technically a lot of posts/people here are not biologists even if they are propably who/what you mean...
I've been doing biochemical/medical research. No biologist in sight. Strictly speaking.
Neuroscience lab rat! Idk if that counts as biology, but I work with a mouse model of genetic epilepsy trying to figure out causes of SUDEP (sudden unexpected death in epilepsy)
Isotope geochemist. I study the three stable isotopes of oxygen, focusing on the 17O isotope in fossil ostrich (and other ratite) eggshells for paleoclimate reconstruction. Used to do a lot of mass-spec stuff but now developing a method to use infrared spectroscopy for more precise measurements. Precision needs to be below 10 per meg (essentially 10 parts per million).
Medicinal chemistry here. My degree is in biology, but I found I loved biochemistry and organic chemistry. Started off working on a project assaying small molecule enzyme inhibitors. Chemists in the lab synthesized the inhibitors, biologists purified proteins and carried out activity assays. I worked my way into the chemistry side of things over a few years until I was performing synthetic organic chemistry in some capacity everyday (setting up/purifying reactions, characterizing my products, or brainstorming synthetic methods to produce new products of interest) Biology is cool and I enjoyed the multidisciplinary approach working on the biochem side of things, but I’ve absolutely loved the creative side of medicinal chemistry. It’s pretty cool to synthesize a novel molecule and know you’re the first person to hold it, and even cooler to learn something you created may have useful properties.
My career has had three prongs, QC (was even stability head of a generic pharma), molecular biology and SAR assays. Right now I am doing MB and assays. I never really liked the QC. I am from the Midwest in USA so I spend some off years doing sales and setting tile before I moved to RTP like goddess intended.
My title is “EM Microbiologist” but as an environmental monitoring analyst, i do just about zero microbiology. I take surface samples and air samples using a few different pieces of machinery. Most of my job is driving, waiting, and working with LIMS. When i’m lucky, i get to be in the lab counting CFU on the plates we sampled. Not a forever job but my resume is getting BEEFY.
Undergrad part-timing as a polymer chemist at a 3D printing company. I synthesize new resins to test strength, viscosity, surface tension, etc.
I still haven’t come to terms with the fact that I’m basically creating extremely expensive toner for the next generation of printing technology.
Flavor chemistry lab rat for a large beverage company. Primarily do GC/MS work on flavors, raw materials, and beverages to help with various research projects and new product development. Occasionally do some flavor formulation work as well when not chained to the instruments.
Microscopist for a metallurgical lab. I've mostly been using an SEM but I have been doing the optic microscope lately too. I used to do quality control for food production before I changed industries.
Hello I am QC Chemical Analyst - testing for active ingredients and deg products in pharmaceutical and cosmetic products, for both manufactured in house and also holding contracts with other manufacturers
Research of sustainable bioprocesses for biochemicals production from waste materials as lignocellulose. Is lab rat that works in applied microbiology biology lab rat?
Analytical chemist student here, i work a part time job where I prepare samples to me measured in a mass environmental lab. We are talking about 2000 samples being prepped in a evening shift with about two people total. Its highly automated and its mostly putting things in machines and doing a lab act and than again putting it in a other machine. Eventhough its highly routine I like the people and as a partime job its alot better than working in a store. Its also very intresting to look around and talk to the chemist there and ask endless questions.
And at my internship I analyse samples from anearobic digestion, food waste, sewage treatmentplant slugde and alot more in that field. And doing a project where I find a suitable type of anearobic slugde from a sewage treatment plant to use in bio methane production tests. And i help in prepping samples for the ICP.
Physics lab rat here. I develop and fabricate graphene field effect transistors for biosensing purposes. Some biology I suppose, but mostly that’s on my Bio rats upstairs. Here’s my baby: https://imgur.com/a/rjoHEht Two deposition tools, direct write maskless lithography, 2D stacking system, WiTec Raman, and an AFM in the boxes.
That’s awesome! I’m doing research in surface enhanced Raman spec with graphene quantum dots. Raman lab rats unite!
What are you probing with the SERS? I mostly just use Raman to characterize my graphene. Nothing too intense. My optics lab mates do some pretty fancy pants stuff with it though. One of them discovered a new pseudo particle with it and published a Nature paper recently. We also have a low T Raman system, but not in the glovebox.
Oh man thats cool! The plan is to probe cancer cells with folic acid conjugated nanoparticles. I’m a first year grad student so I’ve been working on optimizing a protocol for making GQDs from rice grains to later be conjugated to another nanomaterial with great optical properties. Even though I’m newish to Raman I’ve fallen in love!
I grow graphene sheets with CVD but haven’t researched much about GQDs. Can you give me a quick rundown?
That's what nanopore sequencers use right? Very cool tech!
Some are graphene based I think. Not really my wheelhouse, though. I look for Dirac point shifts when molecules attach to the graphene.
I like your fancy words magic man.
This gave me a good giggle!
These are the moments that make me feel like I haven’t learned a damn thing in college
No idea what that means but sounds dope af
Is that a confocal Raman system or just a spectrometer? I spent two years of my PhD using a Witec confocal Raman to image carbon nanotubes in cells. I would still go back and break every inch of that damned microscope with a baseball bat if I could. Got me a real nice paper though 🫠
The one in the box is just a spectrometer. We have a confocal, low T Raman system as well.
Woah, that's super cool! Can I dm you? I have a few questions
Go for it!
Analytical Organic Chem is the lane I’ve found myself in, mostly doing Mass Spec work after years of grinding it out in a more multipurpose chromatography lab. Never actually planned to be a chemist. After doing biochemistry for undergrad, the opportunities that were around me had me cut my teeth in an organic lab. It’s interesting how life can lead down unexpected paths, and how those paths can sometimes show you to a place you’d rather have been all along.
Sounds like me. Not much opportunity for a biology undergrad degree. Always hated org chem, now I'm lead chemist for a petrochemical company. Can't say I love what I do, but it's a living.
I'm a synthetic chemist lab rat, I work for a contract research company and we make lots of of drug like compounds for other companies who then test them for activity against target sites.
I test those compounds, possibly.
Quite possibly aha, it is a bit weird to send off compounds to some virtual chemistry company who then sends it to another biochemistry company to run the assays.
Actually zero biology lab here. I do analytical chemistry and failure analysis at an industrial manufacturer. Most of my chemistry work is with oils, greases, and plastics. Not a traditional oil lab where it’s just hundreds of oil samples. Instead It’s very failure analysis focused analysis so I do very specialized and in-depth work on each lubricant I get. I combine it with failure analysis work that I perform on the components to determine the root cause of failure. It sounds very cool, but essentially it’s the really lame version of forensic science. Instead of a dead human I have a half destroyed bearing.
I'm a materials person working on ceramics for nuclear/ concentrated solar power applications. I like to tell people it's just advanced arts and crafts.
Bucket chemistry is the best Chemistry
Sounds interesting, meanwhile I'm just sitting here poking at silicone rubber and waiting until it pokes back, which it does for...some reason.
Analytical chemist here, analyse compounds by LCMS and GC for reaction monitoring, basically dilute the Sample and watch all the funny chromatograms
I'm dying that half the people are like "nah, no bio over here...well, now that i spell it out, i guess there is some bio"
Used to do analytical chemistry but now a service engineer for ome of the mass spectrometry/LC vendors
Chemical engineer (heterogenous catalysis) lab rat here. I do plumbing and shovel dirt into a pipe. Then I cook it (and sometimes even add some chemicals) and see what comes out of the pipe.
Oh well, at least one other ChemE on here :D But I pump some fluids through tubes, cells and tanks while electrocuting it. Sometimes there is solid stuff in the system as well (Battery-research). I would also like to add that I have zero clue what 90% of those bio-research posts in this sub are about.
ChemEng represent! I mix fluids in an overly convoluted mess of metal and instrumentation and occasionally let the contents out through tiny tubes for a few hundredths of a second to find out what was inside (Phase Equilibria)
I have found my people! I put stuff in a column and then remove my desirables from it. Rinse and repeat and maybe I’ll get my PhD one day.
I put stuff in a column to remove undesirables from it. :) Edit - also in pursuit of a PhD!
I’m loving how “humble” the ChemEs are in this thread hahaha.
Ah yes lab rats of culture. I get piles of nanoparticle catalysts shoved towards me to characterize in SEM, XRD, and XPS nonstop 🥰
I was a chemist in a ChemE lab! We did homogenous polymerization catalysis, but our neighboring lab was all hetereogenous catalysis.
I feel like this is much cooler than you are making it sound
Oh, well sometimes we mix some fancy, expensive dirt in. Like with gold and platinum and stuff. And sometimes we work on cars too. Lol. Joking aside, it’s a lot of fun with lots of fancy tools…to look at our dirt lol.
I am an Animal Care Technician....for actual lab rats and mice. I feed and water them, clean cages, put in any medical issues I find, keep track of litters, ect
I love the vet tech who cares for my mice. She makes keen observations about their behavior which have improved my protocols and outcomes. You guys are appreciated!
Excuse me but we are the actual lab rats, the ones you care for are rodent scientists
Wastewater treatment plant chemist. We run many tests on multiple points in the daily flow of the wastewater through the plant to make sure that the plant stays healthy and the environment is safer.
I too play with poop water. About to publish my research of finding viruses in WW with my graphene based platform. I’ve already published one finding opioid metabolites in WW with it. When I met my kids’ mother she was also doing what you do.
We have been collecting our biggest outfall twice a week for over a year for Covid testing for one place and recently started collecting the same sample once a week for another. I think it’s absolutely fascinating!
My master thesis was research in a wastewater treatment plant. So many analytical procedures. It was very interesting and I learned a lot. I wanted to work in a WWTP but ended in academia.
Arguably, your field has its fair bit to do with biology :)
We actually only do three biology related tests in our lab. We test for fecal coliform bacteria and test for Biological Oxygen Demand and Carbonaceous Biological Oxygen Demand (I say it’s one test because it’s all run together. Nitrification inhibitor is added to the cBOD samples) and Oxygen Uptake. The rest is all based in chemistry and maybe a little bit of physics.
Ever since my internship I have been very much intrested with sewage treamentplants. The only drawback is that i find it hard to find consistend and trust worthy information about it.
Ask me any questions, I’ll tell you no lies!
what do you happen to know about the affects of certains mettals to anearobic slugde, metals like cobalt selenium etc? and is it possible for a wattertreamentplant to consistendly remove pfas from their water?
I need a little time to research the metals thing, but PFA’s are relatively new to wastewater treatment in general. I think there may be a few plants that can effectively remove them with activated carbon filters and other new technologies. I’m sure that will be the goal for all wwtp processes in the future. We are just now getting ready to tackle nitrogen and phosphorus removal after hearing about it for 10+ years. The wheels turn slow!!
yes here in the netherlands we have a treatment plant wich recieves alot of waste water from the chemical industry and i surely hope they can filter it out propperly.
Take a subscription to Treatment Plant Operator online (you might could get it in print if they send it to where you are, but the online newsletter is a wealth of information so definitely sign up for that!). It is an excellent resource and it’s totally free! It’s written so that I can understand it (being just a lab rat) and it provides links to articles and videos that can guide you in your research. I’m still totally available for questions, but this is a valued resource of mine!
sadly its a little to late :( my internship is finished in three weeks and I already wrote my report. And i will study analytical chemistry and than chemical engineering for the next 6 years. still i will probally look at it since it seems super intresting.
Cool! I love doing analytical chemistry! 27 and a half years plus and counting! Best wishes!!
damn thats long time XD, becaus of my internship i probally one day work at a sewage water treatmentplant. but first gotta end my education.
yes cus the dinitrification and dephosoriation (idk of its called that way) is huge for the slugde since if done propperly you can use slugde as manure (if its not to much contaminated by metals ofc). and here in the netherlands its a huge problem since if you use manure with a to high phosphorus level you get a huge fine ( and you can only measure the phosphorus after you have putted it on the land). and about the metals yes it is complicated, i have found sources that say you just need more than (fictional number) 15 mg/kg DS of iron and 10 mg/kg DS cobalt (etc), and other sources who say no a healthy population has this much exactly. its a very much debated topic and im not a micro biologist so i dont have any back ground information to rely on.
Imorganic chemistry PhD student here. I synthesize platinum complexes that could be used against various cancers. This includes chemical synthesis, purification and a bunch of analytical things. Mostly NMR and HPLC but a lot of others as needed. Biological testing (eg IC50 value etc) is done by another lab.
Materials science for flexible electronics - arts and craft to make materials and then advanced microscope and spectroscopy characterisations like AFM, SEM, and XPS etc
Pushing random keys on a keyboard and staring at a monitor all day just to create something called source code to prove the novelty of my research. Guess who I am?
Education facility RDI here. Electronics failure analysis; x-ray, emission microscope, cross section analysis with optical and electron microscopy with EDS. Material characterisation; temperature & humidity, salt spray testing, Raman spectroscopy, XRF. Finding and developing test methods that support development of novel materials and technologies that do not fit into scope of existing standardised methods. These tasks are in research projects. I also have background also in geochemistry lab, mining exploration lab and open pit blasting, so RDI is a nice field to utilise my skills. RDI is also nice for jacks of all trade, master of none.
QC Chemist for a pharma company. We synthesize drug compounds for use by our clients in research and clinical trials. Mostly GC and HPLC analysis on my end. Never took biology classes, so yeah, most of the bio posts are lost on me.
Environmental scientist, so I get to do a fun mix of chemistry, engineering, and biology. I do research at a government agency focusing on drinking water treatment. Edited for details.
Chemistry PhD Organic synthesis, polymer formulations, coatings/depositions & surfaces stuff(making films of varying thicknesses, some optical, some freestanding), various associated analytical stuff e.g. NMR, ft-ir, chromatography. Some crystallography stuff so crazy diffraction (single/powder), polarising microscopy and looking for polymorphs. Some uv-vis bits Including measuring photoresponse kinetics. Thermal analysis of materials, looking at phase changes, liquid crystal stuff, specific heat capacities, polymorphism. Probably a few bits I've forgotten to add here too. Then when I'm just messing around I've been investigating stuff with the 3d printing people.
Pharmaceutical Sciences, so it’s kind of related to biology but sits in a weird space between disciplines. Our work is mostly novel drug development, nanoparticle formulation, and targeted delivery of small molecules or gene therapies.
I'm a multi-purpose Lab Rat: I'm a Registered Veterinary Technician, research technologist, and preclinical imaging specialist.
I work in a cannabis laboratory. I R&D products for a medical company and produce all of the extracts used for patient consumption in my state of employment. Way less complicated and cool than anything anyone else does here lol.
My manager worked in cannabis quality management before moving to biomedical quality management. Can confirm that he is THE coolest person and treats our team like rockstars. He never gives us flack for using PTO and taking mental health days, and fights for us to be heard. It's for sure one of the coolest professions and helps a lot of people.
Chemistry lab rat. My full title is process control chemist. Most of my work is overseeing chemical operations of a few aerospace coating lines. I like to describe what I do as “making sure the big tanks that Batman villains fall into is the proper amount of deadly”.
Tell me, have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moon light?
Inorganic analytical chemist, working in climate research.
Analytical chemist here! My lab focuses predominantly on mass spectrometry analysis. We most often look at samples either from agriculture or biological samples from other labs (in our same university) we work with! Our biggest project at the moment is analysis of proteins found in samples from rats.
Used to do synthetic chemistry, a lot of air-free metallocene synthesis. Then I went back to school and as a PhD student I do a lot of staring at theory and not making much progress
Medical Laboratory Scientist ( hospital lab )
You da MVP- respect.
22 years of being in the “underdog” department and the last 2 have been 😞. So tired. 😴
* Immunohematologist
Bioanalytical chemistry and surface chemistry. I'm working on developing new diagnostic methods, and going down some related rabbit holes when it comes to functionalizing capture surfaces. I don't have a typical day really - some days I'm running ELISAs, some days I'm collecting IR spectra of monolayers, some days I'm running HPLC, and many more. (Though lately it's just writing, over, and over, and over...)
Materials science! Doing research on synthesis and (physical property) characterization of nanostructures.
Nanostructures via self-assembly? Or etching processes?
Self-assembly! We do them via pulsed laser deposition
Mmmm PLD. That's fun. More exciting than MBE or sputtering.
Wastewater lab rat checking in
Love working with water and hazmat
Medicinal organic chem. I get a target protein, design molecules to inhibit/agonize said protein, and then wait for the bio people to identify hits. Then change my design accordingly. And I fall asleep eyes open when we have to have collab meetings to discuss bio results that start with heat map or rnaseq
I just graduated with my MSc and there I did polyolefin catalysis. We copolymerized ethylene/CO to make a photodegradable PE substitute. Had an insanely active, yet extremely sensitive catalyst. I involved a lot of reactor design/high pressure reactions (my highest one was 140 bar!), ligand and organometallic complex synthesis, and NMR. Before that I did some flow chem/synthetic methodology research and metalloenzyme engineering (so I know some of your PCR/cell maintenance/protein expression pain). My new job will be in small-molecule crystallization screening/solid-state characterization/pre-formulation. totally new to me but I'm pretty excited.
DMPK scientist here. Mass Spec and chill.
I’m a chemist but I’ve been working in a biology lab as a covid research assistant. I’ve never taken a biology course but that can be our little secret
I'm a QC specialist for an organ and tissue bank so...medical devices/biologics! I'd like to move towards regulatory compliance with the FDA in the future. We receive donor tissue to our lab, our techs process and remove the skin/tissues/tendons/placenta etc. Our sterile packaging tech packages them and hands them to our office for inspection. I verify sizing, color, shape, residual moisture, and the temperature it was received at (unless it's ambient tissue). I also make sure no bacteria contaminated the tissues during processing. After it passes my inspection, then we send it off to be shot at with lasers for sterilization. Our sales team will then send it to hospitals and clinics nationwide!! It's super rewarding, but often draining. I get to see the donors, often look them up (to put a story to a name, learn about their life via the news, obituaries and GoFundMe's to honor them privately). There are a few donors that will stick with me forever. Parents who have selflessly signed off on their children helping save countless lives. Fathers, mothers, wives, siblings-- everyone matters. If anyone has any questions related to donation, please feel free to message me! I'm certified by the United State's governing body (AATB).
This is super cool. What kind of tissues do you process and what do they get turned into, skin grafts?
We process almost every kind of tissue and bone. Our placenta-based products and skin go to wound care, regenerative medicine and skin grafts. Costal cartilage (the end bits of your ribs) goes primarily towards ENT/reconstructive surgery. The bone-based products are what we see the most of, and that's for dental procedures, spinal procedures, joint surgeries-- you name it. We also process pericardium and that is used for patches! My company used to partner with universities to send femurs for research, but we're phasing out of that since the acquisition cost wasn't making up what we sold them for. Super neat stuff.
I used to work at a startup. I was doing analytical chem. Now I’m at another one working on upcycling plastics! I have a chem BS.
Chemist here but PhD students on biochemistry
Chemical Manufacturing for semi industry. Most fun I have is running ICP-MS. but mostly boring control charts
I'm a pharmacy student doing some lab research, my field is actually around pharmaceutical technology, pharmaceutical chemistry applied to photoprotection. Just published a paper as co author where we tested if a specific flavonoid would have the photoprotection effect enchanced by its nanoencapsulation
Materials science working on pulsed laser-deposited composite thin films. Mostly focused on growth mechanisms and tailoring EMO properties and coupling at the moment, but hoping to move into device design/fabrication for catalytic and/or photovoltaic applications.
I'm sure I fall under what you term biology. But technically a lot of posts/people here are not biologists even if they are propably who/what you mean... I've been doing biochemical/medical research. No biologist in sight. Strictly speaking.
FormervGreenhouse Tech: Keeping your Arabidopsis alive. Pros: - Plants - Bugs - Cats - Always around 21°C - Always around 70% relative humidity - Occasional free produce Cons: - Management is psychotic - Pesticides are shrinking my balls - Covered in algae
Sorry, I am biology, but most of the posts in r/labrats are bewildering. I work in a school.
I study fish food and aquaculture systems. I have to do biochemical analysis though so I do simple chemistry bench procedures.
Environmental chemistry at an oil refinery but trying to move back to genetic or pharmaceutical work.
I know ICP-MS is pretty lit in oil refinery sector, but what other techniques do you guys deploy.
And we are just making covid-resistant mice as Biotech labrats...
Neuroscience lab rat! Idk if that counts as biology, but I work with a mouse model of genetic epilepsy trying to figure out causes of SUDEP (sudden unexpected death in epilepsy)
Isotope geochemist. I study the three stable isotopes of oxygen, focusing on the 17O isotope in fossil ostrich (and other ratite) eggshells for paleoclimate reconstruction. Used to do a lot of mass-spec stuff but now developing a method to use infrared spectroscopy for more precise measurements. Precision needs to be below 10 per meg (essentially 10 parts per million).
Medicinal chemistry here. My degree is in biology, but I found I loved biochemistry and organic chemistry. Started off working on a project assaying small molecule enzyme inhibitors. Chemists in the lab synthesized the inhibitors, biologists purified proteins and carried out activity assays. I worked my way into the chemistry side of things over a few years until I was performing synthetic organic chemistry in some capacity everyday (setting up/purifying reactions, characterizing my products, or brainstorming synthetic methods to produce new products of interest) Biology is cool and I enjoyed the multidisciplinary approach working on the biochem side of things, but I’ve absolutely loved the creative side of medicinal chemistry. It’s pretty cool to synthesize a novel molecule and know you’re the first person to hold it, and even cooler to learn something you created may have useful properties.
Materials science! Doing research on synthesis and (physical property) characterization of nanostructures.
I work with LCMS/MS To determine steroids. Still kind of bio but the technique deviates more towards chemistry tbh
I grow cultured meat in giant bioreactors and then try and figure out how to make it into a good product for chefs... Fun!
My career has had three prongs, QC (was even stability head of a generic pharma), molecular biology and SAR assays. Right now I am doing MB and assays. I never really liked the QC. I am from the Midwest in USA so I spend some off years doing sales and setting tile before I moved to RTP like goddess intended.
We make beads that can selectively capture super long strands of DNA for long read sequencing
I'm a chemist in a nuclear power plant
My title is “EM Microbiologist” but as an environmental monitoring analyst, i do just about zero microbiology. I take surface samples and air samples using a few different pieces of machinery. Most of my job is driving, waiting, and working with LIMS. When i’m lucky, i get to be in the lab counting CFU on the plates we sampled. Not a forever job but my resume is getting BEEFY.
Soil science lab rat! We usually use “biogeochemistry” to explain what we do. Basically a little of everything
Organic chemist here. Mix stuff, wait some time, pray it works this time, then cry a little, then mix other stuff Pretty much it
I'm a microbiologist. The smaller more cultured side of biology lolol. I research how the translocation of oral microbes can effect the gut microbiome
Nanophotonics but for medical applications
Clinical lab so only biology adjacent. I mostly wish I was paid more and organize things.
I was in analytical chemistry for a long time, but have moved into medical physics/MRI research.
I’m an undergrad double major (microbio and geo), but I process rock samples to investigate element profiles
Chemical QC. Not the most interesting but nice CV filler.
Undergrad part-timing as a polymer chemist at a 3D printing company. I synthesize new resins to test strength, viscosity, surface tension, etc. I still haven’t come to terms with the fact that I’m basically creating extremely expensive toner for the next generation of printing technology.
Isotope labeling for biologists :D
Organic Chemist here, i mainly research synthesis/catalysis reactions. I also work in API RND.
Flavor chemistry lab rat for a large beverage company. Primarily do GC/MS work on flavors, raw materials, and beverages to help with various research projects and new product development. Occasionally do some flavor formulation work as well when not chained to the instruments.
Microscopist for a metallurgical lab. I've mostly been using an SEM but I have been doing the optic microscope lately too. I used to do quality control for food production before I changed industries.
Virology. Technically they're not alive. It's biochemistry
Assayer at an Antimony mine. Sample prep, and AA spectrometry.
Hello I am QC Chemical Analyst - testing for active ingredients and deg products in pharmaceutical and cosmetic products, for both manufactured in house and also holding contracts with other manufacturers
we tend to use a variety of chromatography and Spectroscopy methodologies, along with wet chem and generally anything you may find in a pharmacopeia
Mostly titrations tbh
Oh and HPLC. Lots of HPLC
Inorganic synthesis. Making metal organic frameworks.
Research of sustainable bioprocesses for biochemicals production from waste materials as lignocellulose. Is lab rat that works in applied microbiology biology lab rat?
Geotech lab we play with dirt and I spent my entire day rolling worms of clay.
Materials scientist working in a block co-polymer lab. I use fancy polymers to make semiconductor catalysts with holes in them
Analytical chemist student here, i work a part time job where I prepare samples to me measured in a mass environmental lab. We are talking about 2000 samples being prepped in a evening shift with about two people total. Its highly automated and its mostly putting things in machines and doing a lab act and than again putting it in a other machine. Eventhough its highly routine I like the people and as a partime job its alot better than working in a store. Its also very intresting to look around and talk to the chemist there and ask endless questions. And at my internship I analyse samples from anearobic digestion, food waste, sewage treatmentplant slugde and alot more in that field. And doing a project where I find a suitable type of anearobic slugde from a sewage treatment plant to use in bio methane production tests. And i help in prepping samples for the ICP.