{"id":145,"date":"2008-06-11T08:15:32","date_gmt":"2008-06-11T08:15:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/2008\/06\/11\/reduce_reuse_recycle_innovate\/"},"modified":"2008-06-11T08:15:32","modified_gmt":"2008-06-11T08:15:32","slug":"reduce_reuse_recycle_innovate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/2008\/06\/11\/reduce_reuse_recycle_innovate\/","title":{"rendered":"Reduce, reuse, recycle&#8230; Innovate!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I see that Dr Rohn has <a href=\"http:\/\/network.nature.com\/blogs\/user\/UE19877E8\/2008\/06\/11\/in-which-the-italians-also-pass-muster#comment-9998\">thrown down<\/a> the gauntlet.<\/p>\n<p>\nLast year our faithful lab microwave (food use only, no nasty chemicals please) died, and Kate and myself were despatched to K-Mart to buy a new one. I carried it back across Victoria Park (they only employ me for my muscles) and as a reward I was allowed to take apart the old one (I have simple tastes).  <\/p>\n<p>\nWhy, you might ask yourself, is taking apart a microwave considered a <em>reward<\/em>?<\/p>\n<p>\nBecause, gentle reader, the <del>synchrotron<\/del> magnetron contains these:<\/p>\n<p>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.usyd.edu.au\/labrats\/nature\/levmags.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"397\" \/><\/p>\n<p>\n\u2014 two toroidal, and obscenely strong, magnets.  In figure 1 (above) you will notice that the upper magnet is levitating above the lower.  You can use the 15 ml Falcon as a scale guide to estimate how far apart they are.<\/p>\n<p>\nSo this was fun, and provided <del>hours<\/del> minutes of amusement for various people in the lab.  Then I realized that I could save us nearly <a href=\"http:\/\/products.invitrogen.com:80\/ivgn\/en\/US\/adirect\/invitrogen?cmd=catProductDetail&#038;productID=12301D\">twelve hundred Australian dollars<\/a> (which are like US dollars but with a sillier accent).<\/p>\n<p>\nOne of the other postdocs had just planned on using <a href=\"http:\/\/www.invitrogen.com\/site\/us\/en\/home\/brands\/Dynal.html\">Dynabeads<\/a> for some some experiments, and was positively giddy with joy when I suggested that she save the lab nearly <a href=\"http:\/\/products.invitrogen.com:80\/ivgn\/en\/US\/adirect\/invitrogen?cmd=catProductDetail&#038;productID=12301D\">twelve hundred Australian dollars<\/a> (which are like US dollars but with a sillier accent) and use my Levitron(TM) to separate the beads.  After all, a magnet is just a magnet, yes?<\/p>\n<p>\nSo with judicious use of Blu-tac we are able to fit about eight tubes on one magnet:<\/p>\n<p>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.usyd.edu.au\/labrats\/nature\/eppmags.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"681\" height=\"574\" \/><\/p>\n<p>\nThis ticks all the boxes. It&#8217;s not just innovative: it&#8217;s cheap, reduces toxic waste, recycles microwaves and cures cancer in laboratory rats.  I should paint them green and sell them for nearly <a href=\"http:\/\/products.invitrogen.com:80\/ivgn\/en\/US\/adirect\/invitrogen?cmd=catProductDetail&#038;productID=12301D\">twelve hundred Australian dollars<\/a> (which are like US dollars but with a sillier accent).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I see that Dr Rohn has thrown down the gauntlet. Last year our faithful lab microwave (food use only, no nasty chemicals please) died, and Kate and myself were despatched to K-Mart to buy a new one. I carried it &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/2008\/06\/11\/reduce_reuse_recycle_innovate\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/rpg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}