What type of room should I set up my genetic engineering space in?

You can set up your genetic engineering space in most rooms. However, avoid the kitchen and bathroom. You should not set up your space in the kitchen because it is good practice to always keep your experiments separated from food storage, preparation, and eating.

You should avoid the bathroom because there are often molds and other bacteria that love to grow in the damp environment. While they are unlikely to harm you, they will quickly show up to contaminate your experiments. Similarly, you should avoid damp or moldy rooms for the same reasons. Here are considerations when choosing your space:

- Temperature: When performing experiments, the temperature of your space should be between 17 ° C and 25°С. This range is approved for Minilab use and is also important for handling samples. Your space should ideally be in this range at all times. If your kits, and in process experiments are stored at the temperatures recommeded in the manuals (usually in a refrigerator), then the temperature of your space can be out of the recommended range when you are not using it. Once you are ready to work, we recommend using a heater or air conditioner to get your space within the ideal temperature range. The ideal temperature to aim for is 21 ° C.

- Free of insects and rodents: Insects and rodents are pests and vectors (transmitters) for microbes. These could crawl into your samples or like their taste, so don’t let your reagents (a substance or mixture used in an experiment) and other supplies get contaminated!

- Good air quality: When doing most of the projects in this book, you will be growing bacteria on nutrient-rich media (a solid, liquid or semi-solid made to support the growth of microorganisms or cells). Molds floating in the air love to feed on nutrient-rich media. If you notice some strange ‘stuff’ growing in your petri dishes, then you should definitely consider getting a small air purifier with a high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter. Don’t worry, you will learn to distinguish strange “stuff” vs. your experiment in later chapters.

- Working surface and floor should be sturdy and easy to clean: Setting up on a hard, non-porous surface made of metal, ceramics, or plastic is ideal. Whether you’re working on a desk, in a closet or on a countertop in a classroom, as long as the surface will not tip over and can be cleaned by wiping, you are good to go. Because we are working with Minilabs, you won’t need more than one square meter of space (3x3 feet) to perform your experiments.

The floor surrounding your working surface should also be solid and non-porous so that it can be wiped and disinfected in the event of a spill. Carpet is not ideal because you cannot wipe it; if you need to set up in a carpeted space, you should acquire a rubber or plastic floor mat to set under your work area.

- Cold storage (fridge/freezer): As you progress through this book, you will be using kits that should be refrigerated. While it is OK to put the new kits in your refrigerator as long as the package isn’t opened, we still recommend putting all your science materials in a sealed plastic container that you can keep in the refrigerator. Some experiment kits will have components that will need to be kept frozen and you can use a standard freezer for this.

While you are in the middle of your experiments or once they are completed, it is not recommended to put petri dishes containing grown or engineered cells directly in your fridge. While the cells you use in these experiments are not pathogenic, it is still recommended that you follow the golden rule of separating food from experiments! A solution is to use a large airtight Tupperware-type container that can seal your experiments when you store them in the fridge to prevent them from coming into contact with food. Always advise your family or roommates if you have science in the fridge!

Once you progress towards becoming a Genetic Engineering Hero, it is recommended that you acquire dedicated a mini-fridge, a thoroughly cleaned used fridge, or a refrigerated cooler to keep your experimental samples cool for longer storage. Consider this as soon as you can.

- Pets or small children: Just as you want to maintain a pest-free space, you need to prevent pets and children from touching or eating your experiments! To help you, the Minilabs have built-in locks for locking in samples while incubating. However, you may need a locked room or cabinet to store the rest of your experimental samples and to keep curious pets or children from interferring.

Setting up your space should be straightforward. We have completed experiments in many different environments and owe this to the Minilab; we’ve set it up in state-of-the-art university teaching labs at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in budget hotel rooms, and even in the car on longer road-trips. Consider the simple guidelines above, and get going!