Lab Expectations

It's Pi Day! 3.14! π! We've celebrated before, but this year we wanted to do something bigger. Don't get me wrong, we love baking and eating delicious pies, but have we waxed mathematical!? Well this year, CST's bravest of the brave ran our gauntlet of pi-related trivia! They didn't just eat pie, they earned it. Luckily, CST News anchor Jak Stat and the CST News team were live on the scene.

It’s Valentine’s Day. You can’t put out that bowl of candy hearts because…NO FOOD IN THE LAB!!! Okay, fair enough, but there has to be another way to send a message to someone special at the bench. Why not use antibodies to your advantage? The label of your vials might have all the messaging you need!

With the arrival of the New Year, we all look back on 2017 and anticipate the coming year. CST scientists have been working hard to develop new antibodies and reagents to enable your next successful experiment in 2018!

In Roman mythology, the New Year and the month of January are associated with Janus, the god of transitions and doorways (1). Janus is best known for having two faces: one looking to the past, and one to the future. Janus also lends his name to the Janus kinase (Jak) family of nonreceptor tyrosine kinases.

It's hard to believe that another year is almost over. We hope you're having a lovely holiday season with you and yours. We've been fairly busy closing another quarter. But it hasn't been all business. 'Tis the season for a little nonsense to fill us all with good cheer! We couldn't think of a better way than putting on some ugly sweaters and rocking the cafeteria.

In this time of ghosts, ghouls, and other scary things, we got to thinking about how we would respond in the event of a zombie apocalypse (ok, we may have watched a few too many scary movies while waiting for the confocal). Would you grab medicine and food for sustenance? Maybe you think offense is better than defense and go straight for the weapons … Or, perhaps you run immediately for the lab to maintain your 6-year old (and counting) thesis experiment?

Once a year, we slow the centrifuges, quit the cloning, and lose the lab coats, all in honor of relaxation. Our company party gives us a chance to talk about everything outside the lab. We grab a glass of wine or beer and salute the delicious lobsters that fought so bravely. We kick soccer balls and toss Frisbees. We compare notes on sand castle construction.

Cancer research is near and dear to our hearts, but so is having a good time. AACR is an annual opportunity to get out of the office and get after both.

You are glaring at your computer screen with a million thoughts in your head. You just got back the reviewers’ comments on your first manuscript. You don’t know where to start or how to respond. You are angry, frustrated, but mostly confused. The manuscript was supposed to be perfect, how could anyone find anything wrong with it? What you might not realize is that this reaction is normal . . . 

The holiday season is traditionally marked by festive choral music, decorated cookies, and in recent years, ugly sweater contests. CST employees get to experience all three traditions at the same time at the company’s yearly Holiday Concert.

This year’s Society for Neuroscience (SfN) was held in beautiful San Diego, CA. More than 30,000 neuroscientists and vendors attended the annual meeting to share and discuss all topics neuroscience. Of course, neuroscience is a broad, multidisciplinary field ranging from molecules and neurons, to circuits and behavior. As an attendee, prioritizing the symposium talks and posters has always been a challenge, and this year’s meeting was no different.