This is an introductory course for those without previous laboratory experience. During this one-day course, students will learn transferable skills suitable for any laboratory work. The programme provides students with an understanding of safe working practices and experience using essential equipment and protocols. Students may attend this as a ‘stand-alone’ course or as an introduction to the BioGrad Education facility before attending one of our more advanced courses.

The Laboratory Skills (1 Day) programme runs from 9:30am – 4pm with an hour break for lunch. The course includes lunch with time for networking and seeking advice from the lecturers available. The course is taught with a very low student to tutor ratio (one scientist for every 3-5 students) so it is likely that you will meet several scientists during your course. This also allows students to spend as much time as they need to practice techniques until they are confident. We allow students to make (safe) mistakes and correct their own work so that they learn from their own mistakes, and we encourage students to try different approaches to solve a laboratory-based problems.

This is our most popular course and runs many times a year. You will learn about laboratory safety, pipetting, serial dilutions, measuring pH, standard curves and laboratory book maintenance. The course is designed and delivered by research scientists working in both industry and academia, so we always teach the most up-to-date techniques. We alternate lecturers to keep the delivery of this course updated and enthusiastic. Over the years, BioGrad Education lecturers have taught essential practical skills to thousands of graduate students to help develop students’ CV’s and improve their employability after education.

• Laboratory Health and Safety including Risk Assessments and COSHH
• Different pipettes, pipetting techniques
• Use of balances
• Serial dilutions
• Making stock solutions (Molarity)
• Calibration & measuring pH of stock solutions
• Absorbance measurement using 96-well plate reader
• Maintenance of laboratory notebooks

• Prepare and complete COSHH forms and risk assessment for any chemical independently.
• Make stock solutions and explain how they calculate the concentration to prepare the stocks.
• Use the balance to weigh chemicals and prepare solutions of set concentrations.
• Use different types of pipettes safely, adjust and measure the pH of various stock solutions.
• Measuring absorbance.
• Maintain accurate lab book notes.

Unlike other institutions, we do not attempt to ‘cram’ lots of different methods into a short course. This full day covers the basic skills of working in any research laboratory. These techniques are taught correctly and allow time for students to repeat each aspect multiple times. When students leave this course, they are confident in their ability to enter a UK laboratory and work in a safe manner using essential pieces of equipment.

As the course is 100% laboratory based and assumes little to no previous laboratory experience, all levels are welcome to attend.

Upon competition of this course students will be equipped with the basic skills to progress onto one of our other more advanced courses such as Laboratory Skills – 5 days. This course also creates a foundation to be able to confidently progress into university laboratories.

Attendees will gain valuable insights into the range of careers and laboratory research opportunities available. On completion of the course, your new skills will be endorsed by our lecturers on LinkedIn and a reference can be provided upon request.