An incubator is a device used to grow and maintain microbiological cultures or cell cultures. The incubator maintains optimal temperature, humidity and other conditions such as the CO2 and oxygen content of the atmosphere inside. Incubators are essential for much experimental work in cell biology, microbiology and molecular biology and are used to culture both bacterial and eukaryotic cells.
An incubator is made up of a chamber with a regulated temperature. Some incubators also regulate humidity, gas composition, or ventilation within that chamber.
The simplest incubators are insulated boxes with an adjustable heater, typically going up to 60 to 65 °C (140 to 149 °F), though some can go slightly higher (generally to no more than 100 °C). The most commonly used temperature both for bacteria such as the frequently used E. coli as well as for mammalian cells is approximately 37 °C (99 °F), as these organisms grow well under such conditions. For other organisms used in biological experiments, such as the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae , a growth temperature of 30 °C (86 °F) is optimal.
More elaborate incubators can also include the ability to lower the temperature (via refrigeration), or the ability to control humidity or CO2 levels. This is important in the cultivation of mammalian cells, where the relative humidity is typically >80% to prevent evaporation and a slightly acidic pH is achieved by maintaining a CO2 level of 5%.
From aiding in hatching chicken eggs to enabling scientists to understand and develop vaccines for deadly viruses, the laboratory incubator has seen numerous applications over the years it has been in use. The incubator has also provided a foundation for medical advances and experimental work in cellular and molecular biology.
While many technological advances have occurred since the primitive incubators first used in ancient Egypt and China, the main purpose of the incubator has remained unchanged: to create a stable, controlled environment conducive to research, study, and cultivation.
The earliest incubators were invented thousands of years ago in ancient Egypt and China, where they were used to keep chicken eggs warm. [1] Use of incubators revolutionized food production, as it allowed chicks to hatch from eggs without requiring that a hen sit on them, thus freeing the hens to lay more eggs in a shorter period of time. Both early Egyptian and Chinese incubators were essentially large rooms that were heated by fires, where attendants turned the eggs at regular intervals to ensure even heat distribution.
The incubator received an update in the 16th century when Jean Baptiste Porta drew on ancient Egyptian design to create a more modern egg incubator. While he eventually had to discontinue his work due to the Spanish Inquisition, Rene-Antoine Ferchault de Reaumur took up the challenge in the middle of the 17th century. [2] Reaumur warmed his incubator with a wood stove and monitored its temperature using the Reaumur thermometer, another of his inventions.
In the 19th century, researchers finally began to recognize that the use of incubators could contribute to medical advancements. They began to experiment to find the ideal environment for maintaining cell culture stocks. These early incubators were simply made up of bell jars that contained a single lit candle. Cultures were placed near the flame on the underside of the jar's lid, and the entire jar was placed in a dry, heated oven.
In the late 19th century, doctors realized another practical use for incubators: keeping premature or weak infants alive. The first infant incubator, used at a women's hospital in Paris, was heated by kerosene lamps. Fifty years later, Julius H. Hess, an American physician often considered to be the father of neonatology, designed an electric infant incubator that closely resembles the infant incubators in use today. [3]
The next innovation in incubator technology came in the 1960s, when the CO2 incubator was introduced to the market. [4] Demand came when doctors realized that they could use CO2 incubators to identify and study pathogens found in patients' bodily fluids. To do this, a sample was harvested and placed onto a sterile dish and into the incubator. The air in the incubator was kept at 37 degrees Celsius, the same temperature as the human body, and the incubator maintained the atmospheric carbon dioxide and nitrogen levels necessary to promote cell growth.
At this time, incubators also began to be used in genetic engineering. Scientists could create biologically essential proteins, such as insulin, with the use of incubators. Genetic modification could now take place on a molecular level, helping to improve the nutritional content and resistance to pestilence and disease of fruits and vegetables.
Incubators serve a variety of functions in a scientific lab. Incubators generally maintain a constant temperature, however additional features are often built in. Many incubators also control humidity. Shaking incubators incorporate movement to mix cultures. Gas incubators regulate the internal gas composition. Some incubators have a means of circulating the air inside of them to ensure even distribution of temperatures. Many incubators built for laboratory use have a redundant power source, to ensure that power outages do not disrupt experiments. Incubators are made in a variety of sizes, from tabletop models, to warm rooms, which serve as incubators for large numbers of samples.
A bain-marie, also known as a water bath or double boiler, a type of heated bath, is a piece of equipment used in science, industry, and cooking to heat materials gently or to keep materials warm over a period of time. A bain-marie is also used to melt ingredients for cooking.
Humidity is the concentration of water vapor present in the air. Water vapor, the gaseous state of water, is generally invisible to the human eye. Humidity indicates the likelihood for precipitation, dew, or fog to be present.
A thermostat is a regulating device component which senses the temperature of a physical system and performs actions so that the system's temperature is maintained near a desired setpoint.
A hygrometer is an instrument which measures the humidity of air or some other gas: that is, how much water vapor it contains. Humidity measurement instruments usually rely on measurements of some other quantities such as temperature, pressure, mass, and mechanical or electrical changes in a substance as moisture is absorbed. By calibration and calculation, these measured quantities can be used to indicate the humidity. Modern electronic devices use the temperature of condensation, or they sense changes in electrical capacitance or resistance.
The word incubation may refer to:
Egg incubation is the process by which an egg, of oviparous (egg-laying) animals, develops an embryo within the egg, after the egg's formation and ovipositional release. Egg incubation is done under favorable environmental conditions, possibly by brooding and hatching the egg.
STS-65 was a Space Shuttle program mission of Columbia launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, 8 July 1994. The flight carried a crew of 7 and was commanded by Robert D. Cabana who would go on later to lead the Kennedy Space Center. STS-65 was an international science mission that carried the International Microgravity Laboratory (IML-2) on an 15-day mission. Columbia returned to the Kennedy Space Center on 23 July 1994.
An incubator is anything that performs or facilitates various forms of incubation, and may refer to:
The drugstore beetle, also known as the bread beetle, biscuit beetle, and misnamed as the biscuit weevil, is a tiny, brown beetle. It can be found infesting a wide variety of dried plant products, where it is among the most common non-weevils to be found. It is the only living member of the genus Stegobium. It belongs to the family Ptinidae, which also includes the deathwatch beetle and furniture beetle. A notable characteristic of this species is the symbiotic relationship the beetles have with the yeast they carry, which are transmitted from female to larvae through the oviduct.
Respirometry is a general term that encompasses a number of techniques for obtaining estimates of the rates of metabolism of vertebrates, invertebrates, plants, tissues, cells, or microorganisms via an indirect measure of heat production (calorimetry).
Malaria culture is a method for growing malaria parasites outside the body, i.e., in an ex vivo environment. Although attempts for propagation of the parasites outside of humans or animal models reach as far back as 1912, the success of the initial attempts was limited to one or just a few cycles. The first successful continuous culture was established in 1976. Initial hopes that the ex vivo culture would lead quickly to the discovery of a vaccine were premature. However, the development of new drugs was greatly facilitated.
Biolab is a single-rack multi-user science payload designed for use in the Columbus laboratory of the International Space Station. Biolab supports biological research on small plants, small invertebrates, microorganisms, animal cells, and tissue cultures. It includes an incubator equipped with centrifuges in which the preceding experimental subjects can be subjected to controlled levels of accelerations.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to cell biology:
An incubator is a device simulating avian incubation by keeping eggs warm at a particular temperature range and in the correct humidity with a turning mechanism to hatch them.
The chorioallantoic membrane (CAM), also known as the chorioallantois, is a highly vascularized membrane found in the eggs of certain amniotes like birds and reptiles. It is formed by the fusion of the mesodermal layers of two extra-embryonic membranes – the chorion and the allantois. It is the avian homologue of the mammalian placenta. It is the outermost extra-embryonic membrane which lines the non-vascular egg shell membrane.
An Egyptian egg oven or Egyptian mamal is an oven for hatching eggs by incubation using artificial heat. Manmade hatching ovens in Egypt date back to the 4th century BC. Although using old processing methods, they were considered effective at hatching chickens, especially in comparison to other techniques of the time.
Minusheet perfusion culture system is used for advanced cell culture experiments in combination with adherent cells and to generate specialized tissues in combination with selected biomaterials, special tissue carriers and compatible perfusion culture containers.
Surgical humidification is the conditioning of insufflation gas with water vapour (humidity) and heat during surgery. Surgical humidification is used to reduce the risk of tissue drying and evaporative cooling.
Shell-less chick embryo culture is the process of growing chick embryos in vitro, without their protective egg shells, for scientific observation.
The rock dove, Columbia livia, has a number of special adaptations for regulating water uptake and loss.