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Views: 16 Author: vivi Publish Time: 2025-04-15 Origin: Site
Incubator shaker is a common equipment in the laboratory, which is widely used in many fields such as biology, medical research and chemical experiments.
This article is intended to help readers understand how to choose the right incubator shaker for the specific needs of your lab.
The temperature control function of an incubator shaker ensures a stable experimental environment, maintaining a set temperature within a specific range. This is crucial for cell and microbial culture, as different cells and microorganisms require precise temperatures for optimal growth. The system prevents temperature fluctuations that could negatively impact results, providing a stable environment for healthy cell growth. It also allows researchers to control temperature conditions with precision, ensuring reliable experimental data across different temperature settings.
The shaker motion function of the incubator shaker simulates oscillatory motion, promoting mixing of the culture medium, increasing the contact area between the medium and cells, and enhancing oxygen solubility. This is essential for cell culture, as shaking ensures adequate oxygen dissolution to prevent cell growth cessation or death. The motion can be adjusted in amplitude and speed, offering flexibility for various experiments, from gentle shaking to rapid motion, accommodating diverse research needs.
CO2 control is crucial in cell culture experiments, as many cell types require specific CO2 concentrations to maintain stable pH levels. The incubator shaker features a CO2 control system that monitors and adjusts CO2 concentration in real time, ensuring optimal conditions for cell growth. This function is vital for experiments like cell line culture and stem cell research, providing stable conditions to support cell growth and division. The accuracy of the CO2 control system directly impacts cell health and experiment success.
Humidity control is essential for experiments requiring a humid environment, such as cell cultures, microbial cultures, and plant studies. The incubator shaker regulates humidity to prevent evaporation or drying of the culture medium. In cell cultures, low humidity can lead to excessive evaporation, affecting growth, while high humidity may promote bacterial or mold growth. The precise humidity control of the incubator shaker ensures a stable environment, maintaining optimal conditions for experiment accuracy.
Cell culture vs. microbial culture vs. protein expression: Different experiments have different requirements for temperature control, shaker speed, etc.
Cell culture is a fundamental operation in life science experiments, and cells require specific environmental conditions. Incubator shakers play a critical role in ensuring optimal conditions:
Temperature control: Stable temperature is essential for cell growth, particularly around 37°C for mammalian cells. Fluctuations can harm cells, so the incubator shaker must have precise temperature control to maintain consistency.
Shaker movement: Shaking improves oxygen solubility, especially for suspension cultures. The movement speed must be carefully chosen—too high or low can hinder cell growth. Gentle shaking is usually required to evenly distribute cells.
CO2 control: CO2 regulation is crucial to maintain pH stability in the culture, ensuring cells grow in a physiological environment.
Humidity control: Proper humidity prevents excessive evaporation, maintaining the integrity of the culture medium. Low humidity can concentrate the medium, affecting experimental results.
Microbial culture, used for growing bacteria, yeast, and other microorganisms, has relatively relaxed environmental requirements:
Temperature control: Microorganisms can grow within a wide temperature range, typically set at 37°C for most bacteria or 30°C for some yeasts. While precise temperature control is needed, they can tolerate moderate fluctuations.
Shaker movement: Shaking is required to enhance oxygen solubility, with faster shaker speeds promoting faster microbial growth, especially in large-scale cultures. The speed and amplitude must be adjusted based on the microorganism type.
CO2 control: Strict CO2 control is generally not required, except in special anaerobic microbial cultures.
Humidity control: While not essential, maintaining humidity can help prevent excessive evaporation in microbial cultures.
Protein expression involves cultivating genetically engineered cells or microorganisms, like E. coli, to produce a specific protein on a large scale. The requirements for successful expression are complex:
Temperature control: Precise temperature regulation is essential for optimal cell or microorganism growth and protein expression. Temperatures are typically set between 30°C and 37°C, depending on the protein and cell line. Incorrect temperatures can lead to inefficient expression.
Shaker movement: Shaker speed must be adjusted to optimize oxygen supply for protein expression. Higher speeds provide more oxygen, but excessive shaking can damage cells. The speed and amplitude must be carefully optimized for efficient protein expression.
CO2 control: CO2 regulation can support the growth of some cell lines during protein expression, but it's often less critical than in cell culture.
Humidity control: For large-scale protein expression, humidity control may not be necessary, but in small-scale experiments, it helps maintain medium stability and prevents drying.
Experimental scale: incubator shaker s used for small versus large-scale production are different
Small-scale experiments, typically for research and development, require incubator shakers with specific features:
Capacity and volume: These experiments usually need smaller incubators, typically with a capacity of 1 to 5 liters, ideal for small sample volumes. Their compact size is perfect for labs with limited space.
Fine-grained control: Small-scale experiments require precise control over shaker movement, temperature, and shaking rate. The ability to adjust these conditions ensures experiment effectiveness.
Frequency of use: Small-scale equipment is used frequently, so durability and longevity are key factors when selecting equipment.
Examples: These incubator shakers are used for cell line screening, initial microorganism culture, and small-scale protein expression.
Large-scale production incubator shakers, used for commercial production, large-scale cell culture, and protein expression, have specific features:
Capacity and volume: These incubators can hold tens to hundreds of liters of liquid, requiring a larger operating space to accommodate multiple units.
Efficient features: Large-scale production demands high stability and efficiency, with reliable systems for temperature control, shaker motion, and gas regulation to operate continuously under heavy loads.
Automation and control systems: Advanced automation allows for remote monitoring and adjustment of conditions, ensuring consistency across large-scale cultures.
Examples: Large-scale cell culture, microbial fermentation, and large-scale protein expression.
When choosing the right incubator shaker , in addition to the basic temperature control and shaker movement, there are some key features that will significantly improve the experience and effectiveness of the equipment. These features include noise levels, energy efficiency, safety, and convenience and intelligent control.
The CRASTAL brand of incubator shaker series, such as the Incushaker IS-4, Incushaker IS-6 and AEOLUS IS-18, all have excellent temperature control accuracy, shaking function and intelligent control system to adapt to the needs of different scales and types of experiments. Whether it is used in cell culture, microbial culture, or protein expression and fermentation engineering, it can provide efficient and stable experimental support.
Experimental needs and budget: According to the scale, complexity, and budget of the experiment, select the equipment model that meets the experimental requirements.
Communicate with suppliers: Through in-depth communication with suppliers, understand key information such as equipment performance, after-sales service, and technical support.
Future scalability: Choose equipment with a certain degree of scalability and compatibility to ensure a flexible response to future experimental needs. Through a meticulous selection process, you can choose a incubator shaker for your lab that meets your current needs and is ready for the long term, ensuring a smooth and efficient experiment.
Choosing the right incubator shaker is not only a critical step in your lab equipment investment, it's also the foundation for a successful experiment. Making a wise choice based on actual needs and professional consultation, taking into account factors such as temperature control, shaker speed, and equipment safety, will help laboratories make greater progress in biomedical research and applications.
