Imagine yourself in a chemistry lab. You are probably picturing a scene featuring a whole load of liquids – fluids bubbling in round-bottomed flasks, solutions swirling in test tubes, droplets running down condensers. It is a cliché, but one that accurately describes what these spaces have looked like for centuries the world over. There isn’t much frothing or bubbling going on in Tomislav Friščić’s lab, though.