Lab Manager

Scientists at Purdue University's Bindley Bioscience Center have developed surface touch extraction imaging (STEi), a patent-pending automated method that eliminates the multi-step sample preparation (sample prep) required for conventional liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) analysis.

For many, move-in day feels like the finish line. But for users, facility operators, and others, the reality is that it is merely the starting point. Once a team settles into a new lab, the conversation typically shifts from spatial questions to operational ones. While this phenomenon is not unique to labs, the level of interdependence between workflow, safety, and equipment benefits from a continued conversation around how the space supports, or does not support, the program.

Andrea brings 15+ years of experience as an associate principal at Shepley Bulfinch, focusing on healthcare architecture and leading research at Lens, the firm’s strategy practice group. She holds a Master’s degree in Architecture from Arizona State University and a Bachelor of Science in Architectural Engineering Technology from Wentworth Institute of Technology.

PCR in NGS library prep is often treated as a solved problem: select a cycle number, trust the protocol, and move on. Yet many of the most stubborn workflow issues in sequencing labs trace back to that assumption. When amplification is applied uniformly across biologically diverse samples, some libraries are under-amplified and fail QC, while others are pushed into a plateau where artifacts accumulate rapidly.

With over 20 years of experience in R&D and business in the biotech industry, Yann Jouvenot leads product management at n6. Prior to joining n6, he was responsible for product management at Bio-Rad and Imagia Healthcare, following his R&D work with Bayer Healthcare, Sangamo Biosciences, and the Cochin Institute for Molecular Genetics.

Telesis Bio has secured multiple licensing agreements with artificial intelligence (AI)-native drug discovery companies for its Gibson SOLA platform, an on-premises enzymatic DNA synthesis system that compresses the cycle time from AI-generated hypothesis to experimental result to 36 hours. The agreements reflect a shift in how high-throughput biologics labs treat nucleic acid supply, no longer as an outsourced service but as core lab infrastructure integrated with AI model learning.

Chemical signals are only part of the environment that shapes living tissue. A new review highlights how mechanical forces—including fluid shear, matrix stiffness, pressure, and cyclic strain—affect the development and function of organoids and organ-on-chips. Published in Nano Research, the review brings together research from mechanobiology and microengineering to examine how advanced cell models can reproduce physical conditions inside the human body.

The US National Science Foundation is establishing a research center led by Northwestern University to investigate how the three-dimensional organization of DNA influences cell identity and function. The Center for Genome Intelligence Engineering, or GENIE, is one of three new NSF Science and Technology Centers supported through a combined $90 million investment over five years.

Manufacturers running quality inspection on disconnected instruments carry a specific risk: not just bad parts, but decisions made on data they cannot verify. ZEISS Industrial Quality Solutions will address that directly at IMTS 2026, demonstrating how coordinate measuring machine software, AI-assisted analysis, and connected hardware help quality teams act on measurement data faster than fragmented inspection workflows allow.

USP General Chapter <1117> Microbiological Best Laboratory Practices is informational. It contains no mandatory tests, no assays and no acceptance criteria, and USP intends it to describe good practice rather than to impose it. It is also, in practice, one of the documents an inspector is most likely to have read before arriving at a microbiology laboratory — and a substantial revision to it is currently open for comment.