PLOS Biology

Leveraging open hardware to alleviate the burden of COVID-19 on global health systems

Publishing date: 2020-05-06 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: With the current rapid spread of COVID-19, global health systems are increasingly overburdened by the sheer number of people that need diagnosis, isolation and treatment.

ElectroPen: An ultra-low–cost, electricity-free, portable electroporator

Publishing date: 2020-02-07 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: None authors: Gaurav Byagathvalli, Soham Sinha, Yan Zhang, Mark P. Styczynski, Janet Standeven, M. Saad Bhamla link to paper: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3000589 Icons made by catkuro from www.

Knowledge-guided analysis of omics data using the KnowEnG cloud platform

Publishing date: 2020-01-23 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: None authors: Charles Blatti III, Amin Emad, Matthew J. Berry, Lisa Gatzke, Milt Epstein, Daniel Lanier, Pramod Rizal, Jing Ge, Xiaoxia Liao, Omar Sobh, Mike Lambert, Corey S.

Nessys: A new set of tools for the automated detection of nuclei within intact tissues and dense 3D cultures

Publishing date: 2019-09-26 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: Methods for measuring the properties of individual cells within their native 3D environment will enable a deeper understanding of embryonic development, tissue regeneration, and tumorigenesis.

Nesting box imager: Contact-free, real-time measurement of activity, surface body temperature, and respiratory rate applied to hibernating mouse models

Publishing date: 2019-09-05 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: If you’re trying to measure animal activity without disturbing a hibernating animal your options were previously limited and expensive but the growing utility and shrinking price of sensors, cameras and single-board computers has enabled this device for monitoring mice nesting boxes using a Raspberry Pi and an infrared camera for under $400.

Harnessing robotic automation and web-based technologies to modernize scientific outreach

Publishing date: 2019-07-29 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: Technological breakthroughs in the past two decades have ushered in a new era of biomedical research, turning it into an information-rich and technology-driven science.

Scientific Community Image Forum: A discussion forum for scientific image software

Publishing date: 2019-07-04 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: Channel Editor Summary: In open source software, open code and free software is only the tip of the iceberg. Successful open source projects tend to have strong communities supporting both contributors as well as users - but this often comes with the hidden cost in volunteer (or staff) time and resources.

A 3D-printed hand-powered centrifuge for molecular biology

Publishing date: 2019-06-17 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: None authors: Gaurav Byagathvalli, Aaron Pomerantz, Soham Sinha, Janet Standeven, M. Saad Bhamla link to paper: https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3000251 Icons made by catkuro from www.

Low-cost (<€5), open-source, potential alternative to commercial spectrophotometers

Publishing date: 2019-06-12 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: None authors: Vasco Ribeiro Pereira, Bill Stephen Hosker link to paper: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3000321 Icons made by catkuro from www.flaticon.com

Bio-On-Magnetic-Beads (BOMB): Open platform for high-throughput nucleic acid extraction and manipulation

Publishing date: 2019-02-01 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: Channel Editor Summary: Open-source, scalable and high-throughput protocols for purifying DNA and RNA using magnetic beads are presented, providing easy to use methods for some of the most common processes in molecular biology.