Is the future of biology... Robots?

Head on over to Opentrons to learn more about their incredible robot: opentrons.com/
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A liquid handling robot is basically a genetic engineer's dream. They can save a ton of time, streamline workflows, and generally make life in the lab easier. Today I'm showing off my new OT-2 from opentrons and using it to make bacterial paintings.
Github: github.com/thethoughtemporium...
Previous videos:
Genetically modifying bacteria - • How I Defeated My Arch...
Neuron project - • Growing Human Neurons ...
3d printer files:
github.com/Opentrons/otone_ha...
2019.igem.org/Team:Marburg/Ha...
Special thanks to Jonah from inventability.ca for the 3d printed racks
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Store: thethoughtemporium.ca/
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Website: thethoughtemporium.com/
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[@saugesmith2760]

This guy is almost singlehandedly reinvigorating my interest in Biology

[@wardfiesel1332]

The man created mine XD

[@sontapaa11jokulainen94]

@@wardfiesel1332 same here

[@zoutig.4725]

Almost?

[@p_h261]

soo true, he created mine

[@spencermanyet5336]

He is for me!

[@appc23]

i suggest stabilizing the table, the googly eyes are making the entire thing wobble

[@surfmanfish]

The amount of shake from the robot arm moving is jarring.

[@yangyeshuai3686]

Epoxy it to a 100kg granite countertop

[@Kenionatus]

Was noticing that as well and wondering whether the base of the robot would stable enough to not move (significantly) when properly attached to a stable and rigid surface.

[@suryanshtagore7180]

maybe its a feature not a bug

[@jozefvindis4926]

Agree, I would sugest sturdier / heavier table and/or limit accelerations for the moves if its possible.

[@waterunderthebridge7950]

I felt the opening problem in my pipette-scarred fingers, the sheer collective lifetime lost to mindless pipetting is just wow

[@benjamint5619]

Although very cool, these machines aren't really useful outside of standardized routine tests, as for the average PCR or whatever programming and setting this up will take longer than doing everything by hand. You won't find one of these in the typical research lab unless they routinely process things like blood from patients or whatever

[@waterunderthebridge7950]

Always room for improvement tho, maybe our (grand)children will one day be able to skip some of the hassle of endless pipetting in standard protocols 😉

[@thethoughtemporium]

@@benjamint5619 Robotic bio is the future. I hate 96 well plates and it takes a fraction of the time to write a quick program and run it with this than it does to do a whole plate by hand. And if you ever have to run the same thing again, just grab the file and you're good to go. This and robotic remote labs are the future

[@rndargis0]

@@thethoughtemporium and that's why I studied in robotics . Robotics automatisation is inevitable after a certain scale, and even if we got to the point that you can make anything in a GUI , you still need someone to program the robot for adding new components and protocols.

[@robertschnobert9090]

@@thethoughtemporium I love you

[@KW-jj9uy]

I can hardly believe it... That is the Vanguard microscope i sold a year ago with micro-manipulators. At the time, i was interested in making cloning equipment. I hope the microscope can be fully restored and made extra nice. the glass needs alignment and cleaning.

[@quillclock]

I love it when art and science rub together. they dont often hang out but when they do its always entertaining

[@Flobbled]

and they were labmates

[@joelkulesha8284]

If you like science and art mingling then looking into early electronic music is probably the coolest thing imo. Tons of really smart people in electrical, mechanical, and electro acoustic engineering putting all of the cutting edge knowledge of the time into making music. People like stockhausen using WW2 electrical test equipment to make music. Or people like Delia Derbyshire using magnetic tape in new and experimental ways in a time when there was maybe 40 tape machines in the UK total. Or the synth makers like bob Moog, don buchla, Serg, etc. All brilliant people making the building blocks that all modern synths are built on. Hell, all of modular synthesis on its own is super cool, even today. Like there is a module for modular synths call the squid axon and it's a simulation of how real squid axons work, but applied to a musical context. Its all really cool stuff, well worth looking into! (Don buchla is probably the best place to start for that mix of art and science, plenty of documentaries about him too)

[@abadlydrawnsnowman1648]

um... Architecture?

[@Simien.0]

Art is science.

[@TheFalseJared]

@@Simien.0 Both the words "art" and "science" are so loosely defined that the sentance "Art is science" is meaningless

[@Clockworkbio]

Wow--you know you're on the really cool side of KZbin when you're getting Opentrons product placement. I interviewed there a few years back and have been excited for them ever since. Glad to see they're killing it and sponsoring some of my favorite folks out here!

[@DeviRuto]

I'm thinking you should bolt the robot's frame or the workbench to the wall. Those vibrations are scary.

[@recklessroges]

Counter point: Or the mechanical vibrations introduced by the motors might be introducing fluid mechanics to the samples that could lead to a discovery?

[@johannesvahlkvist]

@@recklessroges breaking news: bakteria filled liquid sloshes when moved

[@chemieju6305]

Also maybe do the old 3d printer trick and set it onto a big stone/concrete slab

[@oldkingcrow777]

​@@chemieju6305 or do the oldest trick in the book, and put something squishy underneath lol

[@pyronac1]

i wish there was a hackerspace near me. but damn yours would be my dream.

[@truestopguardatruestop164]

Same

[@asailijhijr]

I didn't think there was one in my area, but then I found out it was inside my local library (which I hadn't been to in many years).

[@pyronac1]

@Internet Guidance actually i have indeed been thinking about that myself. unfortunately it is not something i can afford right now. time and money are an issue.

[@savage101.]

My local hackerspace is ruined by the elitist mentalities of the people that have been there longer and became "master instructors" somehow, even though they struggle to hold a .01 tolerance. My 10+ years of aircraft lathe manufacturing experience meant nothing to them. 🤷‍♂️

[@iluvpwny7565]

8:20 I thought it's a submarine until he said it's a thumb up

[@matejlieskovsky9625]

That is a subliminal instruction to subscribe! XD

[@KX36]

i thought it was a 2D Benchy

[@tankart3645]

I thought he was showing us the middle finger.

[@fureversalty]

You're now like the NileRed of Biology, can't wait for the new projects!

[@Ithirahad]

Bacterial pigment red. BioRed?

[@namAehT]

Funny enough, NileRed is also moving to a new lab. I actually assumed at the start of the video that they were moving into the same lab, since they have overlapping needs and have collaborated before.

[@marianh69]

your videos literally made me choose a biology career.

[@truestopguardatruestop164]

I am going to choose it too. I still need few years to start studying the specific bio engineer. Let me know if at school they teach things he do or not.

[@Verlisify]

"It even made a reminder to like the video" I thought that was a submarine...

[@Durtle02]

How come I always see you in random comment sections lmao

[@blendpinexus1416]

same, i thought it was a submarine

[@kentvandervelden]

Labs in transition between companies often scrap the old equipment. The computers are generally removed or the instruments are custom, so reverse engineering needed if the manufacturer will not help. I've visited a few of these labs to help the new owners repurpose or salvage equipment. The quality (and original purchase price) of the equipment is generally high. Not sure how how to locate them in general, but lab robots, especially plate and liquid handlers, would be typical finds. Someone will probably know someone...

[@mathewjoshy9774]

How can one follow that locally ?

[@fenice319]

0:15 MY EARS, I was not expecting that spike in volume

[@antonelloprodomo1473]

I got some This old Tony vibes

[@DehimVerveen]

I got medlife crisis vibes: If it ducks like a quack!

[@xusdk]

@@DehimVerveen i came here looking for this comment!

[@joshgilligan5466]

This is very cool to see! We use an Eppendorf liquid handling robot in our lab and often the GUI is extremely frustrating and limiting, as a handy tip for agar plates, older ones loose a little moisture and things stick better so you might not need a blowout step. You could also let your plates dry out a little when you get a decent hood and that will help also.

[@goodboiadvsp3297]

"I made Minecraft Steve IRL out of living voxels" - title of your next video

[@StopChangingUsernamesYouTube]

"What is my purpose?" "You are a pixel." "Oh my god."

[@Altair2000]

i’m being taught how to do covid tests at walgreens. please don’t let your boy steal my job

[@constantprayerwarrior]

Boy?

[@Altair2000]

@@constantprayerwarrior the robot

[@n.g.s1mple29]

Its too late, your gonna be homeless soon

[@Altair2000]

@@n.g.s1mple29 goddamn it

[@virutech32]

@@Altair2000 if it makes u feel better so will everyone else so at least u wont be lonely:)

[@brainletmong6302]

2038: "I taught my Alpha-7 Sentience Class AI how to genetically edit a perfect catgirl clone to my tastes"

[@_cyber_cookie_]

now this, this genius

[@virutech32]

ah the obligatory catgirl comment, very nice👍🏽

[@Smitchprime]

Ur profil photo got me for a sec

[@_cyber_cookie_]

might as well make some foxgirls while we're at it

[@dargtagnan3696]

Wdym 2038, in Japan you can legally investigate that RIGHT NOW

[@TheLophius]

Would it be possible to use something like a tattoo needle to "tattoo" bacteria in to agar to limit splash back and make dots super small?

[@fred_e]

unklikely

[@sjege]

Putting bacteria into agar creates a different kinds of problems, mainly that it cant exchange gasses. If it is aerobic it will most likely just not grow and anaerobic will have limited growth.

[@NilesBlackX]

Unfortunately no, the way tattooing works involves a pretty substantial amount of ink spread across the surface, and a small amount is carried down by the needle on each stroke of the machine. So there is plenty of 'splash' and spread, and they aren't hypodermic or anything; when tattooing, you simply wipe the excess ink off the surface at regular intervals. Not a good option here 😉

[@azuredragonofnether5433]

Stereotypical Scientists of the Future: I cloned a human! This Scientist: I taught a robot draw a Creeper Face with bacteria.

[@sirareus]

One of the coolest "Subscribe" signs I have ever seen. The lab looks great.

[@saucelessbones5872]

Imagine 3d printing an entire human skeleton with your own DNA , so when you need a bone replacement you have spear part

[@jskratnyarlathotep8411]

biospears \0/

[@azertyuiop432]

I'd prefer to grow a brainless clone of myself for organ harvesting

[@benjaminbarr8714]

Human bones have dense blood vessels which move lots of blood through our bones.. yours is a novel idea but practically impossible.

[@noeljonsson3578]

Spear?

[@iplayksplol9974]

SPEAR PART SPEAR PART?

[@BloodAsp]

You should definatly make a bio QR code to your webpage!

[@sacation6057]

YES PLEASE! it should be doable when looking at the link pixelart, and then send give them away as promotion to labratories, no bio enthausiast can resist the urge to scan a biological QR code righy?

[@s33wagz]

I dont come to your channel enough but i've been subbed for awhile and dig every video i watch. I think I've recommended your channel more times than the amount of your videos I've seen haha. Excited to hear your plans and see what the channel has become. Truly awesome content man!

[@feliksjakubow8372]

I am very glad that this is the reason for the break in posting videos, and I am extremely glad you're back!

[@tdarkwolf2434]

Nice, I love the new space. I'm exited to see some of your awesome work out of the new lab!

[@VitaminTheG]

can't wait to see the mountains you'll move! Keep up the great work and congratulations on achieving the dream for diybio/biohacking!

[@cccircuit8296]

Yay! 🎉 You finally got a proper setup! This should relieve a lot of difficulty so you can focus on your work and the videos, I can't wait to see more, maybe regular (?) content from you. You're Awesome! 😊

[@tokalanz]

Welcome back. I've missed your videos and I'm looking forward to see more.

[@Benivator2]

I'm happy to see you improved your tools. People really dont appreciate the importance of a consistent workspace and reliable tools.

[@The.Talent]

I thought I recalled this machine from pre-COVID, so when this was your first video on it, I was a little surprised. Glad you’ve finally got a space to use it!

[@dr.fistingstein1566]

BROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.... super excited to see the new lab and workshop in action, in the future. Bring on the science!

[@hullinstruments]

Congratulations man! Nothing better than watching someone with the knowledge and drive to push things forward and help everyone learn! Folks like yourself truly deserve the tooling and the facilities to allow them their activities. Especially since it benefits so many people! For The huge number of us who came to your Channel long ago… A lot of us are interested in the optical, laser, electronic, and radiation stuff that brought us here. Hopefully much more of that in the future 🙏 Some of us just aren’t cut out for biology, and were glad to leave it behind in college or high school

[@ShannonMcCraryH]

Can't wait to see your future projects!

[@nefariousyawn]

I'm pretty excited about your new lab! I'm also hoping you come out with more food related vids on your other channel.

[@UnrelatedAntonym]

Great news on the new lab and equipment! Really looking forward to seeing all your new projects there! I love learning from your videos and how you make your projects. How fine can you try printing with that pipette machine? Can you possibly print organics into electronic components with it?

[@IanGrams]

Hah, I was just wondering about the feasibility of tip washing after you'd talked about how many you go through. Cheers for answering that curiosity not long after. That's an awesome robot and the new space looks amazing. I greatly look forward to all the cool stuff you're gonna make there.

[@brown56765]

I'm very excited for more progress on the neuron project!

[@richardepps8500]

Love the new lab. I just built Myself a laminar flow hood. Can't wait to see how yours turns out. :)

[@AscendtionArc]

Thanks for this video. Congratulation on your new lab :) .

[@FullModernAlchemist]

Holy moly dude I can’t believe that new lab. So amazing to see how far you’ve come.

[@Zircuitz]

"Most errors occur between the keyboard and the chair" That cracked me up a little 😂

[@muuuuuud]

Congratulation on the new work space, can't wait to see what it will allow you to do in terms of research.

[@AA-gl1dr]

Thank you so much. I love your channel more than nearly all other channels. If I wasn’t funding my own lab I would gladly donate to your patreon. Still might. Please never stop.

[@Elenthiriel]

FiiiiiiiiINALLY a channel for what i love with high quality production

[@kylebowles9820]

Nice new lab!! Can't wait to see what you do with it

[@pollosama1634]

Nice work! Just two things that could be interesting for you. Have you thought of 3d printing a petri-dish sized plate with tiny spikes to create small wells on your agar while it solidifies? this could solve the droplet leaking problem. Also, people tend to use alcool at 70% to kill bacteria instead of 100%. The problem with 100% is that it can make some bacteria sporulate as a defence mechanism. This tends to happen less with 70%.

[@Itssmial_Ova]

WOW! Congradulations on your new lab man! Definately has a less jury-rigged bio-lab vibe (To be honest I loved that vibe) But stolked you've got a new hangout.

[@Smokkedandslammed]

Dude! What a bad ass upgrade! Your killing it brother!

[@JB-dm6zt]

I think the table the machine is on is a bit wobbly. Loved the vid though, glad to see you back :)

[@rustycobalt5072]

If ya add a lot of weight near the bottom of that table to get rid of a lot of vibration/movement effects Edit: probably...

[@creature2322]

Keep it up dude, can't wait to see your further progress in the near future. 🙂

[@benmcreynolds8581]

That Link pixel art 🎨 one was by far the best. It was crisp and didn't have any splashes around the other areas

[@LuxxyOfficial]

new lab looks lit. looking forward to the new stuff you couldn't have done before.

[@VeryHighPriest]

okay but I'd litterally die to see a "a boy and his atom" style stop motion animation with the bacteria paint robot

[@svartmetall48]

Our Beckman i7 protocols were used for covid sample prep - all in one sample prep using multichannel manifolds and a span 8 to allow both whole plate pipetting and single well. I use the i7 for mass spectrometry sample preparation, cellular extraction etc. the liquid handlers are a gamechanger. For entire protocols though, the cellario setups from HighRes are where its at.

[@benjaminbroudy2982]

Your videos have inspired me to want to pursue a major in microbiology. I find it so fascinating that we can like keep little microscopic bacteria alive in a dish

[@mozkitolife5437]

Hey man, very excited to see that set up. Jealous is a huge understatement. Congrats on the -80. It's super compact (I've never seen them that small). You messaged me about getting one and I thought it was going to be the huge units I have in my lab but that's a really cool and space(spine)-saving solution. A suggestion on the meniscus issue: can you set agar in a large, shallow tray and use the petri dishes as cookie cutters to extract the inner, flat areas? I know agar is fragile but if you get a very shallow tray, lay all the petri dishes on top, press them down with a board, then flip the entire thing (like the baking a cake trick), you might get really flat agar canvases to work with. You might need to add an air hole to the petri dishes with a soldering iron (they work great on polystyrene). And like others have said, deal with that wobble :) Can't wait for what your channel has in store.

[@vicpro1]

Your videos keep blowing my mind. Keep it up!

[@zephyr9450]

Your new lab looks amazing.

[@SpencerPaire]

That subscribe push is amazing! So clean!

[@Silver-xp3es]

Loving the new lab!

[@anthonydesouza9983]

That’s awesome! Congrats on the new space. I'm curious how much a lab similar to that would cost (in equipment).

[@lorenzo5749]

Living the dream my man! Looking forward for new videos

[@GiomDe]

cant believe i just randomly typed in my fav youtube scientist who never uploads to find out hes building my dream lab D'; its also the first of your videos ive watched ever since studying bio myself, which makes me all the more jelly of that robot you got. Also if you get the bioprinting working you might be one of the sole people on earth to posess a 3D printed bone-knife. That'll surely piss off the japanese knife making guy xd

[@Veptis]

That lapspace looks great. But it kinda takes a way the "you can do at home in your hobbyist space". Or all the homebuilt tools. The professional options do have merit. Excited to what's coming next tho. Having the liquid be level is a big task in lithography when you spread the photo resist. But it's a much smaller scale than bacteria medium. Perhaps a similar approach works (spinning it really fast)

[@ransombot]

If you have those transducers from the sonoluminescence video still might try using those to agitate the agar. If it's anything like cement should work well to level it out before you print.

[@0xTJ]

That new lab space looks amazing!

[@michaelclark4876]

Someone else may have mentioned this, but Alexander Fleming was an early microbial artist. Back then he had to use different bacteria to get different colors, and they grew at different rates and growth patterns, and their interactions as they grew were important for getting the right effect. This was likely an important preparation that made chance favor his prepared mind when he noticed how that Penicillium mold contaminant produced something that killed Staphylococcus on his plates.

[@gerbil7771]

Awesome stuff, great to see another video.

[@oscardb9131]

so excited for a lab tour when done

[@aliceweirdopants4297]

you just continue to be my personal definition of sci fi. please dont over produce, u are just too awesome

[@Koeng101]

You can solve the tip-agar problem by slowly dispensing above the agar, making a droplet on the tip, and then poking the agar. The droplet should then absorb into the agar. You get a little hole in the agar where the tip poked it (the droplet still makes a little circle), but other than that, it is a reliable method for plating that I use with my p20M to do high throughput transformations.

[@nickmagrick7702]

that link and jellyfish is pretty cool. You should be proud of that its original art im pretty certain

[@ghostnebula6286]

I'm gald to see this channel again. I would love to see a studio build if others are intrested.

[@Relfar2]

Love good robotics for lab work

[@MrAdzielinski]

I’d like to see more on the plant booger thing and what combinations are possible. Specifically I’m interested in what can grow with mangrove cells.

[@MarcelRobitaille]

You should consider turning down the acceleration to prevent it shaking your table so much. You can change this in /var/data/robot_settings.json. Brought mine down by an order of magnitude and it helped a bunch. I have no idea why Opentrons sets it so high by default.

[@OhHeyThereCx]

Realllly making me wanna switch fields with your videos

[@bottlekruiser]

It would be pretty cool to run a cellular automaton like GoL on actual cell cultures, if such a thing is even possible. Robot could set up initial conditions really precisely.

[@marialiyubman]

The water painting is so satisfying!!!

[@Korvash1]

Good to see you back ;)

[@fatgamer919fan4]

Could you plz make a part2 on neuron project, big fan, keep on the good work

[@geoffdavids7647]

3 minutes ago?! Last time I was this early cavemen were still discovering fire

[@thecrazy8888]

Nice lab! I'm sure Nile Red would approve! and that machine... I want one even though I have no use for it lol.

[@Meneer456]

Awesome lab and shop!! How do you finance all of this?

[@sickboi11111]

More spider yeast please! I want to see a space elevator grow out of the sky!

[@chrishaert6854]

What a cool video idea thanks for making this.

[@tarynrose6927]

You have my absolute dream job... hell, I'd love to work with you and do sequencing and bio work 🥺

[@scottbruner9987]

The content we are used to is amazing. So with the new digs, wow. Sky's the limit! Carry on, 🧪!

[@anesthetized7053]

dude that minecraft creeper could literally be sold as a poster print, its soo cool. kind of has a outerspace / scifi feel to it.

[@catvatar]

I believe you could improve accuracy of the machine just by putting a heavy plate under the machine or bolting the table its sitting on to the wall. There is a lot of visible vibration from movement of the pipet head. 3d printers have a similar problem and it could be easily avoided.

[@tomasruzicka9835]

Hi from watching your video i feel like you have unstable table on which the robot sits. It then can create artifacts on the final product and also could create those random spots. If for example there is a droplet on the end of the tip and the tabe shakes thanks to the movement of the robot arm, it could as well propel the droplets out of the tip on the random spot in the dish.

[@gudadada]

I feel like this channel is kinda the NileRed of biology, it's great.

[@jim2725]

I could recognize that Kurtzgezagt poster from a mile away, I have the same one!

[@wyattc6572]

i knew i recognized the style lol

[@juliusceasar8987]

A test that isn't really bio related that I would want to see is freeze-drying a measured quantity of water and then compare that with how much of it that is caught by the cold-trap. I suspect that quite a lot of moisture is being past through the vacuum-pump. Some user of the low maintains pump claims it to fog up the room it is used in.

[@andrewcuzzolino8277]

Yes, new video!

[@printer7196]

I NEED to see your additive manufacturing room, I am a 3D print addict.

[@Sleighbells96]

Hey I noticed that there was a fair amount of vibration in the solution, if that becomes an issue you might want to find a more rigid table to put it on or what I found works really well for 3d printers is to put some of those paver stones you can find at any home improvement store and put them underneath the corners. I don’t know much about biology so I can’t say if the vibrations will hurt anything, but I do know 3d printers so if they do hopefully that helps!

[@thethoughtemporium]

The table is going to be bolted to the wall. The tables in the original lab and temporary lab were free floating, but the new one is rigid so that doesn't happen