Friday, January 11, 2013

The Sounds of Synthesis

Ever paused for a moment, standing in front of your hood, and just listened?

Labs sure are noisy places! But if you really love the "hands-on" aspect of the gig, you can't stand to walk into a lab devoid of all the onomatopoeic chatter our instruments and equipment make.

The whoooosh...pop | click! of an NMR spectrometer engulfing samples

The sci-fi whirs and sputters of fraction collectors and Biotage robot arms

The omnipresent susurrus of fume hoods and make-up air

The reassuring oily gurgle of a well-maintained high-vacuum Welch pump

The crystalline *ping*ping*ping when hot molecular sieves meet cold glassware

The unmistakable FWOMP of an imploding Dewar bath

The "shwack, shwack" noise as you put on protective gloves

"Listen! [Doo-wah-ooh] |
Do you want to hear some glassware? [Doo-wah-ooh]"
Finally, my personal favorite...high-pitched glassware harmonics. You can make these a few ways: by carefully running gloved fingers up a new pipette, slowly twisting an improperly lubed ground-glass joint, or when certain surfaces (rubber mats, wooden dowels) rub flask walls.

Happy listening!
-SAO

5 comments:

  1. The best noise is the sound of an NMR tube sliding into the machine. As an undergrad it was the first thing that made me really feel like I was actually doing research.

    The worst noise has got to be the sound of metal on dry ice though. Even nails on a chalkboard don't compare.

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    1. I find it equally grating! Good one.

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  2. My personal favourite was the UV/Vis Microplate Reader. The endless cascade of "PhrrrPreet, PhrrrPreet, PhrrrPreet..." as the Microplate wells were read one by one never failed to make me sink into a dreamy state of research bliss.

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    1. Ahh, microplates! Forgot about those, despite one that operates just across the room from me. Good capture of the sound with that word!

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  3. Doing experiments at a beamline on a Synchrotron is pretty darn deafening. Constant airflow and the continuous hum of hundreds of computers and fans.

    I like the noises that automated flash chromatography systems make (like the Combiflash RF), because it reminds me of all the work the system is doing that i had to do when running a column normally, and it happens much faster.

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