Life by the sink at Algenuity

algenuity • Apr 01, 2019
Truth be told, scientists can be an untidy bunch. Throw algae into the mix and it only gets worse, and that’s where I come in. I’m responsible for making sure that all the glassware and plastics are clean and available for use in our daily experiments.

Washing the labware is quite a long and involved process and takes around four hours from start to finish. Several bleaching, disinfecting and rinsing steps are needed – with both mains and reverse osmosis water – followed by baking in an oven to dry. Afterwards, I clean the items with isopropyl alcohol to remove any pen markings and cover them with aluminum foil to keep them sterile. Sometimes a plastic flask is accidentally baked at too high a temperature, and the resulting melted mess is no good in the lab but makes an appealing ornament on my mantlepiece.

My working life has been quite eclectic. After 13 years in retail, 14 years in a factory packing heating thermostats, a little time ironing from home and then working in a funeral parlour, it didn’t seem all that odd to add algae cleaning to the list. Andrew needed someone to do just a few hours of washing a week – nothing too taxing I was told! – and six years later, I’m working almost solidly at the sink for two and half days, cleaning up to 100 flasks a day, not to mention the much larger 10 litre vessels.

Being trained by Andrew and Sam, I naturally have the same high expectations for cleanliness. If something is left by my sink, it gets cleaned, and sometimes I like to teach my colleagues a little cheeky lesson in tidiness if they leave a flask casually lying around! When someone new arrives, it’s my job to convert them to our way of thinking. It seems like students often think they don’t need to wash their lab coats but, under my watch, they soon learn differently.

The company is very supportive of its staff. When I first started working at Algenuity, I thought that I’d do my job and then go home and forget about it. But you get to know everybody and appreciate the family feel, making it enjoyable to come into work every day. No doubt if we continue to grow, there’s the possibility that we’ll need another person to help me. And obviously, one day, I might like to retire. Andrew says I’ve got to give him three years warning so he can train somebody else. We shall see!
About Algenuity 
Algenuity is an algae technology development and licensing company with world-class expertise in algal biotechnology, solving problems that deliver a positive global impact. Algenuity’s multidisciplinary team develops proprietary and integrated solutions that increase productivity and performance of algal strains, reduce time to market for algal bioproducts, and boost overall profitability. These enabling technologies include the Algem® labscale photobioreactor, a non-GM directed evolution platform, GM strain engineering platforms, and novel bioprocess development and optimisation tools. Algenuity is located in Stewartby, Bedfordshire, within the United Kingdom’s Golden Triangle for biotech between London, Cambridge, and Oxford.

For more information, visit www.algenuity.com 
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