Is your research at risk? Best practice in maintenance, preservation and storage

Best practice in maintenance, preservation and storage should be a central part of any research project that involves the use of microbial cultures that would be difficult to replace, but this is not always the case.  Contamination of cultures and genetic drift can easily occur, especially when strains are being used for long-term programmes of work – it is all too easy to lose track of how many times your strain has been cultured since it was originally isolated. It’s not just contamination and strain drift that can cause issues …