The Lab Technicians at DANDRITE are crucial for our laboratories as they conduct experiments, analyze data, maintain equipment, ensure safety compliance, and perform various essential tasks that contribute to accurate and reliable scientific outcomes.

Lab technicians in Denmark often undergo vocational education and training (VET). There are various VET-programs available, and one specific to lab technicians is the "Laborant" program. This program typically lasts 2 1/2 years and combines theoretical classroom learning with practical, hands-on training in laboratories. Often lab technician programs may include an apprenticeship component, where students work in real-world laboratory settings under the supervision of experienced professionals. This allows students to gain practical skills and apply theoretical knowledge.
 

Taro Kitazawa, Group Leader:

"The Lab Techs in my lab take care of ordering and invoices. Lab safety (e.g., AU rules, waste, chemicals). Routine experiments (e.g., mouse genotyping, plasmid construction, prep of buffers, and reagent). Communication with facilities (e.g., mouse facility, department admin). Danish communication is useful. They get tips on lab management from daily communications with other techs and Danish people in AU"

"I have experience from Japan and Switzerland, and I got the impression that Danish techs are specialized to be ‘technicians’, rather than ‘researchers’. Maybe because Danish techs are normally educated in tech schools, which is different from PhD-postdoc researcher paths"

Sadegh Nabavi, Group Leader:

"Our lab technician is mainly involved in routine works. This includes administrative jobs, helping students in some of their basic experiments. For a couple of reasons, I found it more difficult to get technicians to do more advanced experiments such as surgery".

"I am more positive with our lab technician than those I worked with abroad. Our lab technician takes her job more professionally and seriously and is more organized".

"The role of lab technicians I think varies more across labs than across countries. Doing the administrative jobs is common but the details of what lab-works they may do vary more".

Benedicte Vestergaard is the Lab Technician in Poul Henning Jensens lab. Here she shares her tasks during an average work-week

Monday

• Meet at 7:30 AM.
• Morning: Various ad hoc tasks:
  • A dripping faucet in the lab
  • descaling the office coffee machine
  • Tidying up and recharging pipettes in the cell lab 
  • Checking emails, settling accounts in IndFak, and shipping two packages - one with dry ice
  • Meeting with Poul Henning Jensen and Lasse Reimer and planning and initiation of experiments in Greece 
  • Meeting with Poul Henning Jensen about ELISA results and Western Blot, Australia samples
• Afternoon: Laboratory work:
  • preparing samples for Western Blot and starting ELISA 
  • Additionally, handling various emails and planning for the rest of the week
• Workday ends around 3:00-3:30 PM.

Tuesday

• Morning:
  • Emails
  • Planning for Greece experiments
  • Visit from building services regarding the dripping faucet
  • Lab: ELISA - blocking plates, diluting samples, etc.
  • Lab: Starting Western Blot
• Afternoon:
  • Continued Western Blot
  • Updating Labbook with new ELISA and WB experiments
  • Assisting PhD-student Karen Marie from Nykjær Lab with centrifuge/starting her experiments in 1182
  • Emails.

Wednesday

• Morning:
  • Group meeting from 9:00-10:00 AM
  • Laboratory work - ELISA and Western Blot.
  • Obtaining small coverslips for PhD-student Nanna 
• Afternoon:
  • 1:00-2:00 PM Biomedicine "Energy-saving"/climate ambassador meeting
  • Processing ELISA results
  • Following up on the list of antibodies and miscellaneous items for experiments in India - sending an overview to PHJ
  • Contacting building services again regarding the dripping faucet.

Thursday

• Morning:
  • Checking emails, etc.
  • DANDRITE Internal Meeting from 9:00-10:00 AM
  • Lab: Western Blot.
  • Finding a centrifuge adaptor for PhD-student Karen Marie 
• Afternoon:
  • 12:00-4:00 PM course at the Laboratory School on "Waste Management in the Laboratory."

Friday

• Morning:
  • Water on the floor in our freezer room in the basement - leaking water pipe
  • Coffee on the floor in the kitchen - coffee machine overfilled!
  • Again, various ad hoc tasks - autoclaving waste from our cell lab, refilling pipette tips & various plastics in the lab, making common buffers, etc., emails 
  • 10:00 AM Friday bread with "old" colleagues from when the institute was called Biochemistry and was in building 1170. A cozy tradition - we meet every other month for coffee and Friday bread
  • In the animal stable - checking animals for breeding, earmarking, experiments.
• Afternoon:
  • New overview for our animal caretaker - what needs to happen with which mice
  • Processing results from Western Blot and ELISA, updating the lab book with the experiments - sending results to Poul Henning
  • Follow-up on the planning of experiments in Greece
  • Various emails
  • Settling accounts in Indfak
  • Planning for the next week.