Can we Eliminate Single Use Plastic in UK Biotech?

However, these products are being adopted for food packaging, with only a few examples available for laboratory use.

There is a strong case for us take a closer look at our plastic waste. A study in Nature estimated that for institutes and SMEs, each bench scientist generates around a tonne of plastic waste per year. In 2014 around 5.5 million tonnes of lab plastic waste were generated globally. That is equivalent to the combined tonnage of 67 cruise liners, and equal to 83% of the plastic recycled worldwide in 2012.

Single-use plastics that have been used in a laboratory for only a few seconds can last centuries in the natural environment. Many types can be recycled, and there are now hundreds of products designed to be compostable in landfills, while still giving the user all the benefits they are used to with conventional plastics.

At CryoLogyx, our products use the same single use plastic everyone else is using, because right now it is the best solution. Our assay ready, cryopreserved, pre-plated cells come in polystyrene multi-well plates because they are robust, sterile, long lasting and fit seamlessly into our customers’ workflows.

What our products can help you do is significantly reduce the volume of plastic your lab generates.

To prepare just five plates of cells for an experiment, we estimate that bench scientists use and throw away a minimum of thirty seven different pieces of single use plastic. If you used our assay ready plates, you would only need to use six – five of those being the assay ready multiwell plates, and just one pipette tip to add

To find out more and order your plates today, go to www.cryologyx.com or contact us info@cryologyx.com warm media to thaw the cells. That equates to an 86% reduction in single use plastic waste in your lab.

We have designed our product to fit seamlessly into whatever your current cell culture workflow is; you don’t need any other special media or thawing equipment. Plates are made ready to use in less than a minute of bench scientist time, compared to the hours required for conventional cell culture. And since our plated cells can be stored frozen and used on demand, they can help reduce the time-to-experiment from several days to less than 24 hours.