Methods of Preventing Contamination of Cell Culture Flasks
Cell culture flasks are vessels for laboratory cell culture and cell expansion. Cell growth requires a specific environment and temperature to avoid contamination caused by improper operation and affects cell growth.
Brief introduces cell culture flask:
Cell culture flask materials:
Cell culture flask materials are without inner pads and are often used for airtight cultures to ensure their air tightness. There are many types of caps for imported cell culture flasks: airtight caps, polyester caps, breathable caps, diaphragm caps, cell culture flask vented caps, etc.
Different types of cell culture flasks:
- Torticollis: easy to pour, pipette or cell scraper can easily enter the bottle;
- Straight neck: It can reduce the shaking of the cultured gene and flow into the bottle cap;
- Triangle: Pipettes or cell scrapers are easier to reach the corners of the bottle, and the broad base increases stability;
- Turtle neck: A pipette or cell scraper can easily enter the bottle body, which can reduce the shaking of cultured genes and flow to the bottle cap;
- Rectangle: The curved-neck rectangular culture flask has a slope design from the bottom to the top of the bottle, which is convenient for pouring, and the pipette or cell scraper can easily enter the bottle.
How to prevent contamination in cell culture flasks:
- Wash hands before the experiment: Many experimenters do not wash their hands and go to the experiment as soon as sprayed the alcohol, which is wrong behavior.
- And wash your hands carefully with soap/soap up to between wrist and nail, twice is a good option, then spray alcohol on your hands.
- Some people wear half-sleeved white lab coats to do experiments. And should fasten the cuffs of the white coat.
- If not, should place the cuff towards the arm and be sure to spray alcohol on exposed wrists.
- While wearing gloves, avoid touching the outside of the workbench with your hands. If you must touch it, spray it with alcohol.
- When taking the all of cell culture flask sizes and mediums, please support it under the support, and do not take the bottleneck.
- At the beginning of each experiment, it is a good choice to illuminate the ultra-clean bench/lab with a UV lamp for 20 minutes
- Try to avoid talking during the operation, especially play and laughing are strictly prohibited in the cell.
- Observe the cell status every day. If you notice cells growing abnormally, discard them. Also, check your media and incubator for contamination due to mycoplasma in the air.
- Improve aseptic technique and strict aseptic operation, and For new laboratory personnel, experienced personnel should assist and strictly supervise their experimental operations
- In addition, should record every contamination incident in order to analyze and solve contamination problems.
- Because it is common for foreign cells to carry contamination, it is important to choose a reliable source of cells.
- In the absence of a separate cell incubator, grown cell cultures in lidded flasks, not culture plates or unsealed dishes.
- Additionally, should process with different media and reagents at the end of the day, followed by thorough sterilization of the bench.
There are more introduces about how to clean cell culture flasks, the types of cell culture flasks, etc.