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November 5, 2024
7 mins read
by Charlotte Ward
Letʼs talk about getting up and running with an ELN, specifically, I want to talk about what I call the activation energy of implementing an ELN. The team I work on here at Labstep brings the users and the software together, to help users make the most of the software. We take the new users through those first steps in digitization and hopefully, helping them on their journey to making the most of the data they are generating in the lab. As we all know, change can be hard whatever the situation and this can be particularly true when weʼre talking about adapting complicated lab processes.
By definition the work going on in labs is often complicated. When the processes for record keeping evolve organically around difficult work, a defining factor is often how easy it is for the user to follow these processes at the point of data capture. In practice, this can often mean researchers are adding data points into a spreadsheet or scribbling observations in a notebook because, in the absence of more structured processes, this is the simplest option to the end user.
When lab users are looking to move from these organic processes to an ELN, (and there are plenty of good reasons to do this, but this is a topic for another day), a barrier to implementing an ELN solution is often how well suited these organically evolved methods are in terms of ease of use at the point of executing the work.Veering off this path can feel hard, sometimes frightening and frankly, at best, inconvenient. But I use the term ‘feelʼ here, rather than ‘isʼ because what I want to discuss here is the activation energy of using an ELN. That is to say, once we get passed this initial hurdle, on our first foray from the path of least resistance, there is opportunity for an easier path, we just need a push to get there.
Activation energy is a familiar concept in chemistry; it is the energy required for a reaction to occur. That is, to get something to happen there needs to be some kind of kick to start it all. What we believe at Labstep, is there is an activation required when implementing an ELN solution in order to transition from the organic processes to something that provides net gains. Imagine a spreadsheet that your lab is using to record data. Maybe itʼs recording your glycerol stocks, what is in them and where every vial is stored. Maybe it is tracking your samples and new data points are added to sequential columns as you collect them. Whatever the function of the spreadsheet, it is easy to store the such a spreadsheet on a cloud service and for all lab members to access, add data and edit the data as required. Now if the lab wishes to move to using an ELN, herein lies an example of the activation energy of this transition because, there is a system already in place which for at least certain functions, works. I believe that key to overcoming the activation energy though is look past the immediate transition, to understand the net gains, particularly for the end user, which come with implementing a more structured system.
This is main one and is huge, so this is the one I want to stress the most. This activation energy often only exist in the very beginning. Organic record keeping processes were also once new, lacked finesse and contained friction, but they have evolved and been shaped over their period of use - sometimes this amounts to the same spreadsheet being used for years. We can shape the processes in a digitized laboratory as well but we don’t need to take years to do this. We just need to build things the way we want them. Thus lowering the activation energy.
Imagine you are going to paint your shed but it’s a big job and you’ve been putting it off. You’re not sure where the paint brushes or even that they were cleaned last time they were used. You still need to order the paint and masking tape. The weather forecast is never looking quite reliable enough either. We’ve all procrastinated on work because there are too many barriers in the way to get started in the first place. Now imagine this: you notice a sizeable break in the weather so you step up to your shed. The dust sheets are laid out, the paint is waiting next to them with the clean brushes. The masking tape has been applied to the hinges and someone may have even started cutting in for you. Are you going to dive in and get the shed painted? Of course! The friction has been removed now you can get the job done. This is what we want to do with Labstep, remove the friction, so you can dive straight into the job. More Science. Less Grind.
Here’s the same logic applied to a more lab centric activity. You notice there’s a gap in the bookings for your lab’s normally highly in-demand plate reader. You know this because the bookings for this device are being recorded on your lab’s ELN. You have an assay to run, there’s several steps, involving various reagents and fairly long protocol. But you can autogenerate your experiment to capture data with the SOP already in it from a template because this has been set up in the ELN. You’re not going to be tempted to scribble down your initial OD reading in a paper notebook because you’ve got a data field set out in your experiment template; a clear box to enter your data as soon as it comes in. You can see at a glance all reagents you’re going to need for this protocol they’ve appeared on the side of this experiment entry as soon as you generated and what’s more you can see that you’ve got these items available in your lab. If you don’t know where to find any of them, you can get that information too. Precious time is not lost before you even get your assay started, scrambling around trying to locate all the resources you’re going to need for this experiment (gathering your paint brushes and dust sheets if you will). You can get your assay run in the time available for your plate reader booking. You can auto-capture the data from the plate reader and enter it into a designated field in your experiment template. This is reduced friction, which ultimately lowers your activation energy.
The above is about how using an ELN, when set up correctly, can make work easier at the point experiment execution and of data capture. It is also important to consider however, what gains can be achieved by using an ELN when you come to look at data retrospectively. This is because organically evolved processes tend to be great for quickly scribbling down data, but where they so often fall very short is once you come to look back at data. Imagine the scenario in which something unexpected comes up, such as your cell sample aliquot turns out to be contaminated. This aliquot of cells has already been used in a handful of experiments, how do you deterimine exactly which? In an ELN you can instantly see which experiments this item has been used in and all the data that has been generated associated with this item. Time is not lost trawling through word processing documents trying to find out specifically which data points have been generated from this sample.
What about if you’re trying to take a birds-eye view of your research. Now imagine you are trying to find a highest expressing strain of a bacterium with a recombinant gene. Your expression levels are looking promising with one particular strain but you’ve got a feeling you haven’t quite nailed the experimental conditions to reach its optimal expression level. In an ELN you can quickly see which experiments this strain as been used in so you can assess these experimental conditions collectively. Again, this kind of activity is always going to be much harder, when step one is to first gather all the relevant information which might scattered across a number of different documents, which have not been explicitly linked on referenced.
Hopefully what I have illustrated here is that the friction that is sometimes felt at the point of implementing a new software tool or process should be a temporary situation. When we get past this activation energy, we have the opportunity for processes that ultimately provide greater ease of use and efficiency. It can just take a bit of a kick to get there.
