PrintrLab incubator: A portable and low-cost CO 2 incubator based on an open-source 3D printer architecture

摘要

Growth in open-source hardware designs combined with the decreasing cost of high-quality 3D printers have supported a resurgence of in-house custom lab equipment development. Herein, we describe a low-cost ( $400), open-source CO 2 incubator. The system is comprised of a Raspberry Pi computer connected to a 3D printer controller board that has controls for a CO 2 sensor, solenoid valve, heater, and thermistors. CO 2 is supplied through the sublimation of dry ice stored inside a thermos to create a sustained 5% CO 2 supply. The unit is controlled via G-Code commands sent by the Raspberry Pi to the controller board. In addition, we built a custom software application for remote control and used the open-source Grafana dashboard for remote monitoring. Our data show that we can maintain consistent CO 2 and temperature levels for over three days without manual interruption. The results from our culture plates and real-time PCR indicate that our incubator performed equally well when compared to a much more expensive commercial CO 2 incubator. We have also demonstrated that the antibiotic susceptibility assay can be performed in this low-cost CO 2 incubator. Our work also indicates that the system can be connected to incubator chambers of various chamber volumes.