Getting the most equipment bang from your research bucks
In a science lab, many pieces of equipment cost a lot of money. At the same time, these instruments must provide high performance, sometimes at a level that even the researchers themselves find amazing. In today’s research environment, scientists often discuss the shrinking availability of funds. In fact, scientists have always struggled to find ways to afford the best equipment for their labs. Ultimately, price must be balanced with performance. The question is: How do you do that?
There’s little doubt that scientists demand high-performance products. For a 2016 report from BioInformatics (Arlington, VA) called “Enhancing the Customer Experience: Insight and Life Science Supplier Rankings,” more than 1400 scientists from academia and industry from around the world participated in a survey. In a webinar, Bill Kelly, BioInformatics president and cofounder, said, “We asked life scientists what is most important to them when purchasing life science products.” In this survey’s results, product integrity came out on top. “Clearly a product must work for its intended use,” Kelly said.
So, performance really matters. Otherwise, many experiments go for naught. Nonetheless, the price of an instrument cannot be ignored. When asked how to balance price and performance in buying new equipment, Kelly Drew, professor of chemistry and biochemistry in the Institute of Arctic Biology at University of Alaska Fairbanks, says, “It always comes down to what money is available.”
This suggests that scientists really value high performance in products, but the researchers can only spend the money that is available. That means that grant or other funds can dictate where the balance between price and performance lands.
Building a balance
Knowing where to look can provide researchers with more options. The key desire is to get the best performance at the lowest price. When asked if that can be done, Grant Bowman, assistant professor of molecular biology at the University of Wyoming, Laramie, says, “I recently bought some used Bio-Rad equipment through eBay.” This included a thermal cycler, a power supply, and various DNA gel items. “It’s a good brand that matches with other equipment I have in the lab, and which I bought new through Bio-Rad with my startup funds,” Bowman explains. “eBay gives me low price and high performance, as long as the used equipment wasn’t beat up during its time in past laboratories.”
Where Bowman looks depends in part on what he’s looking for in new equipment. “For really expensive things, like fluorescence microscopes, I go for performance over price,” he explains.
A few decades ago, many scientists included another option in the mix—build it. Although a scientist probably won’t build a genome sequencer, many things can be built in the lab, which can save money and still provide high performance. Lab-built devices can even be customized to specific applications. I’ve built a wide range of electronic devices—from instrumentation amplifiers to movement sensors—and most of them cost far less than a commercial device would. In some cases, a trip to Radio Shack to buy a few electronic pieces, some creative reengineering of their purpose, a little work in a machine shop, and there you have it—a custom-build instrument for a few dollars.
Today’s scientists still build things, and the build-or-buy question often depends on how much customizing is required, not to mention the odds of success. Whatever approach a researcher takes, some balance must always be considered.