Dr. Justin Siegel: Lab Automation, Cloud Labs, and the Future of the Wet Lab

Dr. Justin Siegel explains the past, present, and future of wet lab work and wet lab automation. We start by hearing a description of what it is like to work in a wet lab, covering the contrast between the excitement of seeing life changing results and the countless hours of monotony that is often involved to produce these results. 

We then begin discussing where automation will fit in to help alleviate the burden of long term monotonous work in the wet lab. We learn about the challenges of implementing automation in a lab, and hear about the dream that exists from the promise of automation versus the reality of implementing automation in an actual academic lab or in industry. We also hear Dr. Siegel’s take on the current state of implementing automation in an actual lab right now. We hear about the intricacies of implementing automation, such as discussing the pros and cons of different types of brands of robots, hearing about how lab robots can end up sitting unutilized or underutilized in academic labs, and considering practical questions that are involved when implementing automation. We end our discussion of robots that could be purchased with a discussion on Opentrons.  

Finally, we discuss cloud labs. Dr. Siegel starts by explaining what cloud labs are. Then, we hear about how a scientist would actually go about utilizing a cloud lab service. Dr. Siegel shares his thoughts on the potential promise of cloud labs and gives justification for the excitement surrounding this new approach. Dr. Siegel also shares his personal experience using cloud labs and how things like the accuracy and reliability of cloud labs can already make it a viable option for automating academic lab tasks. He also explains an unintended benefit of using cloud labs in that it allows researchers to spend more time thinking critically about the tasks that need to be done and how they will be done.