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You Know You’ve Been In the Lab Too Long When…

Written by: Dr Nick Oswald

last updated: October 7, 2024

This has been doing the rounds all over the web, so I thought I’d post my 10 favorites.

You know you’ve worked in the lab too long when…

  1. You wash your hands before you go to the toilet
  2. You tell your family to store the milk “at 4°C”
  3. You cry when your cells die
  4. you wonder what it would be like to experience ‘death by autoclave’
  5. You suddenly realise you’ve been using sterile technique when opening a jar of mayo
  6. You can tell the OD of your culture just by the smell
  7. You can’t watch CSI without cursing at least one scientific inaccuracy
  8. You’ve worked out that a trained chimp could probably do 90% of your job
  9. You are strangely proud of the collection of junk you’ve stolen from vendors at trade shows
  10. You can no longer spell normal words but have no trouble with spelling things like immunohistochemistry or deoxyribonucleic acid

…any more?


You made it to the end—nice work! If you’re the kind of scientist who likes figuring things out without wasting half a day on trial and error, you’ll love our newsletter. Get 3 quick reads a week, packed with hard-won lab wisdom. Join FREE here.

Nick has a PhD from the University Dundee and is the Founder and Director of Bitesize Bio, Science Squared Ltd and The Life Science Marketing Society.

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