Investigation of liquid measurement method using syringe for the purpose of substituting micropipette

Abstract

Micropipettes are commonly used measuring instruments in life science research. Since the volume is in micro little units, it is highly versatile for other experiments. In recent years, basic molecular biology experiments such as gene recombination experiments of Escherichia coli and electrophoresis have been conducted in high schools. Accompanying this, the introduction of micropipettes is being promoted. In addition, detailed instructions on how to use a micropipette are provided in textbooks and collections of materials. Micropipettes are relatively inexpensive at around 5,000 to 10,000 JPY per pipette, but hundreds of thousands of yen are required to prepare for the number of students in the class. Syringes are instruments other than micropipettes that can measure liquids in units of micro little. For example, Terumo’s 1 mL tuberculin syringe has a minimum scale of 0.01 mL (10 μL). Therefore, in this study, we investigated a method of using a tuberculin syringe as a measuring instrument in micro little units instead of a micropipette. As a result, there was no significant difference between weighing by syringe with correcting for one memory and by micropipette. Since each syringe costs 20 to 30 yen, it will be a cost-effective alternative to a micropipette.