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How to become Well Suited to the Necessary Tools in a Laboratory
For most people in this world, a laboratory can be a confusing work environment. Unless you went to a prestigious university and studied one of the laboratory based sciences such as microbiology, chemistry or some type of physics, you may not have a clue what you are looking at when it comes to laboratory equipment. Unfortunately, even those who may have graduated from college with a science degree but lack any formal training in a lab may find themselves completely lost as they stare across the vastness of a working lab and wonder what exactly everything is used for. Countless graduate students and newly hired workers for pharmaceutical companies face this challenge every day of the week, as they begin a new career path that may require them to work in a lab for the very first time. Luckily enough, there is hope, as you can easily learn about each and every one of the important tools in a lab even if you lack the necessary experience to operate them.
If there is any one thing that all labs have in common, it is that you will find no shortage of chemicals there. One of the most common laboratory chemical compounds found across the globe is distilled water. Unlike regular water from your tab, distilled water is essentially completely deionized and has had just about all of the impurities present in regular water removed. Distilled water is used on a daily basis in just about any science lab since it does not react with other chemicals as regular water would. Perfect for both biological and chemical labs, distilled water is a basic laboratory chemical you will grow accustomed to using quickly in a lab. Your laboratory supply areas will be full of all of the necessary chemicals you will be using in the lab. However, not all chemicals are as harmless to use as water, and for compounds that can easily be toxic or carcinogenic to humans, precautions such as a laboratory fume hood must be used. A fume hood is essentially a large device which will prevent harmful vapors from entering the lab and is of the utmost importance if you handle deadly pathogens or toxic chemicals in your lab.
While it is mostly used in biological labs, a laboratory centrifuge can also be found in many chemistry labs. Centrifuges are actually very similar to many of those flying saucer rides which you may have seen at a carnival or theme park except for the fact that they spin many, many times faster. Essentially, a centrifuge will allow a laboratory worker to separate different parts of a compound or mixture into well defined layers thanks to its incredibly high speed of rotation. A laboratory mixer will do roughly the opposite of a centrifuge and will instead mix multiple ingredients into a solution. Along with the centrifuge and a mixer, you will be required to learn how to use a variety of other laboratory instrument devices. One such device is the laboratory balance which will allow you to weigh exact amounts of chemicals so your experiments can turn out precise and without error.
Some final components of a working lab include the laboratory oven and the laboratory freezer. A laboratory oven should not be confused with a laboratory furnace, as the oven is used to heat things up while the furnace is used to dispose of hazardous chemicals that can be safely burned after disposal. Biology labs will generally get the most use out of a lab freezer, as many tissue samples and various enzymes and other biological compounds must be stored in freezing cold temperatures to increase their shelf lives.