In video games, as in anything electronically generating data, the rule is to save early and save often. You never know when the next crash is going to come or when a boss is totally going to own you because you didn't spend those last couple of hours leveling up like you were supposed to.
In science, there are also checkpoints. In synthetic chemistry, every new product is a checkpoint, and if you're smart, you don't use all of it in the next reaction if it's new to you. In biology, checkpoints are frozen down cells. When you're generating cells for experiments, the worst thing you can do is run out of cells because if you're going to repeat the experiment, you're going to need a constant supply of cells, and, when the cells are particularly precious (like you made them yourself and you can't just buy them from some company), you had better have a backup. It's much better to spend two weeks growing up some backup stem cells then to have to make new stem cells from scratch.
And stuff does happen. Things get contaminated; cells just up and die. And months of work is lost. (oh yeah, biology timelines can be rough. Instead of oh man I spilled this flask and there goes 3 hours of work, it's like oh man I spilled this flask there goes 5 weeks of work.)
So, it was with great relief that I froze down 23 vials of cells this May 28. It was a rough process. It took....very long.
And then I went home and LJ dyed my hair.
In science, there are also checkpoints. In synthetic chemistry, every new product is a checkpoint, and if you're smart, you don't use all of it in the next reaction if it's new to you. In biology, checkpoints are frozen down cells. When you're generating cells for experiments, the worst thing you can do is run out of cells because if you're going to repeat the experiment, you're going to need a constant supply of cells, and, when the cells are particularly precious (like you made them yourself and you can't just buy them from some company), you had better have a backup. It's much better to spend two weeks growing up some backup stem cells then to have to make new stem cells from scratch.
And stuff does happen. Things get contaminated; cells just up and die. And months of work is lost. (oh yeah, biology timelines can be rough. Instead of oh man I spilled this flask and there goes 3 hours of work, it's like oh man I spilled this flask there goes 5 weeks of work.)
So, it was with great relief that I froze down 23 vials of cells this May 28. It was a rough process. It took....very long.
And then I went home and LJ dyed my hair.
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