BATH & CHILLER

RESOURCE GUIDE

Questions to Ask When Buying

a Bath or Chiller

Water Bath Basics

Features to Consider When Buying

a Laboratory Water Bath

Choosing the Right Fluid for Your Chiller

Baths and Chillers: All Roads Lead

to Efficiency

Bath and Chiller Design Derives from

Both Capacity and Utility

Bath & Chiller Resource Guide
Questions to Ask
When Buying a
Bath or Chiller
What type of bath or chiller is best suited to my
application?
There are many options for water- or bead-based baths, and it is
important to select the one best suited to your application based
on factors such as contamination, the ability to incubate samples
on an angle, temperature ranges, and more.
Similarly, there are many different types of chillers to choose
from including air- and water-cooled designs, and selecting an
appropriate chiller size is essential to ensure optimal cooling
and efficiency. It is important to consider the heat load and heat
dissipation required for the intended application, among many
other factors.
How can a bath or chiller accommodate
temperature-sensitive samples or processes?
A wide variety of baths and chillers are available that can
accommodate temperature sensitive samples. Most baths
are outfitted with heating and cooling capabilities, usually
controlled by either analog or digital means. For more precise
control on temperature sensitive samples, a circulating bath
may be best. These baths can control temperature within
±0.1°C of the desired temperature.
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?
What if I am dealing with non-routine samples
or analyses?
For laboratories that have a wide variety of processes or
regularly run into non-routine samples or analyses, using a more
robust system may help speed up preparation and downstream
analysis. Many vendors offer advanced systems capable of
highly precise temperature control, plus the ability to perform
reciprocal or orbital agitation. Some systems also come with
the ability to pre-program temperature controlled shaking
protocols, which can save money by freeing up technician time.
Top 5 Questions You Should Ask
When Buying a Bath or Chiller
1. D oes the product have any exclusive
features? What sets it apart from other
vendors’ chillers or baths?
2. What is the warranty period? What does
it cover?
3. Are service plans available? If so, is there
an on-site option?
4. Does the unit have the appropriate cooling
or heating capacity for the application?
Is there enough reserve capacity to
account for environmental cooling or
heating losses?
5. D oes the manufacturer offer the necessary
accessories for the application? (tubing,
fluid, adapters, electronic interfaces, etc.)
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 Bath & Chiller Resource Guide
Water Bath
Basics
Using the right kind of water makes a difference
By Mike May
Even though they are frequently used, water baths might be
the most neglected pieces of equipment in a lab. Their use
involves heating water to about 98.6°F, placing containers in the
bath, taking them out, adding more containers, and on and on,
creating the perfect environment for growing algae, bacteria,
and fungus. Luckily a few easy steps can prevent your water
bath from becoming a lagoon.
Scientists use water baths for a wide variety of applications. At
St. Olaf College (Northfield, MN), assistant professor of biology
John L. Giannini uses a water bath to change the temperature
of enzyme reactions. “The most important thing is to keep your
water clean by changing it often,” Giannini says. The question
is: What’s the best way to do that?
Pick the right water
It turns out that using the right kind of water makes a difference
in a water bath. Tap water contains dissolved ions and can
cause issues from scaly buildup to chlorine-driven corrosion.
Therefore, it is not the ideal choice for water baths.
Some scientists use water from a lab purification unit. However,
even this water can corrode stainless steel. This is because some
lab purification units include a salt back flush that can leave
corrosive sodium ions in the water. Water containing these ions
can even put pits in a water bath’s surface.
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The best choice is distilled or deionized water, which will
extend the life of a water bath and keep the surface intact.
However, a commercial algicide or biocide should also be added
to completely avoid the lagoon syndrome.
The need to clean
Even after taking these measures, a water bath must still be
cleaned regularly. For full cleaning protocols, consult the manual
or manufacturer. Depending on the water bath, different
guidelines may be advised.
Without specific instructions, a few general rules help. First,
no bleach! Like the wrong water, bleach can corrode stainless
steel. Next, no abrasives! Instead, stick with soapy water and a
soft cloth. If desired, a commercial product made specifically
for cleaning water baths can be used.
Some labs clean their baths with hot water. For that, about 140°F
water for 30 minutes or so should kill any living contaminants
in a water bath. Even after that, it’s still a good idea to empty the
bath and manually clean out any lagoon leftovers.
Take a bead break
If keeping the water clean is just too much work, replacing
the water with beads may be a good solution. For applications
where a bath doesn’t circulate or shake, the water can be
swapped for beads.
Then, it all works the same, but the bath stays cleaner. However,
even with beads, some cleaning is still required. Now and then
– depending on how a bead bath is used – the beads must be
removed and cleaned using ethyl alcohol.
The best approach to heating things in a lab depends on the lab
and, often, the existing equipment. No matter which method is
selected—water or beads—the cleaning doesn’t go away.
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 Gas
BathGenerator
& Chiller Resource
Resource Guide
Guide
Features to
Consider
When Buying
a Laboratory
Water Bath
From construction material to accessories,
numerous options are available
By Erica Tennenhouse
Although typically used for heating and thawing in cell culture,
water baths have a variety of applications in research labs, from
material characterization to histological studies. Whatever the
application, those thinking of purchasing a new water bath for
their lab should consider the range of available features that can
facilitate safety, help avoid contamination, and make the unit
flexible and easy to use.
Water bath safety is all about having over-temperature limiters and
audible alarms that warn the users of extreme temperatures. One
situation that is best avoided is having the heater remain on after
all the water in the bath has evaporated. It is therefore important
to have a safety mechanism in place that can automatically turn
the system off when dry running is detected. Buyers concerned
with safety should seek out UL-listed water baths, and that CE and
CSA certifications can be helpful to have as well.
When using a water bath, contamination prevention is essential.
Toward that end, having a stainless-steel reservoir is a good start
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and transparent covers allow the user to observe the procedure
without continually opening the bath. However, users have
additional options when it comes to the material of construction.
While stainless steel is the most common material, ceramic
interiors may be easier to keep clean.
Regularly draining and replacing the fluid in the water bath
is another key way to avoid contamination, and buyers should
consider how easy that process is going to be. Whether the water
bath has a drain built in, and whether the drain is a simple valve
that can be easily opened or requires a screwdriver to open, can
make a big difference for the user. Two new water bath features
that have received positive feedback are an integrated drain hose
that makes the bath cleaner and easier to empty, and removable
hinge covers that allow one to retrieve samples without having to
place the cover (likely to be dripping with condensation) on the
lab bench.
Additional features that make a water bath simpler to use include
digital controls, integrated timers, and the ability to operate in
both Fahrenheit and Celsius. Because baths are typically shared
within the lab, having presets can make it more convenient to
switch settings between users. A calibration feature can save
the user time and money by removing reliance on a third-party
company to perform calibration.
A water bath must be flexible enough to accommodate the range
of samples and devices that will be placed inside it, from test
tubes to test tube racks to flasks of all different sizes. For example,
if users want to incubate an Erlenmeyer flask that is taller than
the depth of the bath, they require a lid that can be configured
to allow the neck of the flask to stick out but still cover the rest
of the bath to minimize evaporation. Ring covers are available to
enable such a setup.
Finally, a feature that should not be overlooked is the availability
of technical support.
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 Bath & Chiller Resource Guide
Choosing the
Right Fluid for
Your Chiller
Many labs use chillers to control the cooling  combinations, or more sophisticated fluids such as silicone oils. In
for various processes
By Mike May
Picking the best fluid for your application
Perhaps surprisingly, the fluid selection for chillers involves
more than science. After 9/11, import laws changed so that those
importing and selling a fluid were considered the manufacturer.
Therefore, many companies now rely on domestic suppliers.
This means that some vendors might not carry the fluids – or
versions from a particular manufacturer – that they once did.
Still, there are still many chiller fluids available to choose from.
The most common approach
The most commonly used fluid in recirculating chillers for use
below 5°C is a mixture of water and antifreeze (ethylene glycol
or propylene glycol). This antifreeze is the same as what you
would find in your car, and is very affordable. Not all chiller
manufacturers, though, supply fluids. Some manufacturers
will recommend some readily available fluids that you can use
within specific temperature ranges.
Typically, ethylene glycol mixed 50:50 by volume with water
can be used for temperatures as low as -30°C. Propylene glycol
is considered less toxic than ethylene glycol, but when mixed
50:50 by volume with water is recommended for temperatures
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down to only approximately -20°C. These simple mixtures can
be adjusted for lower temperatures by increasing the ratio of
antifreeze to water. In addition to being readily available and
inexpensive, a water-antifreeze mixture is not flammable.
Two extremes
Most chillers are compatible with both water-antifreeze
applications that require more cooling— in the -20°C to -80°C
range, silicone oils are recommended. However, viscosity is an
important consideration, and lower viscosities ensure that the oil
is effectively pumped through the chiller at low temperatures.
At low temperatures, flammability is less of a concern for
silicone oil, but it can be a worry at high temperatures— beyond
those demanded of a chiller, though. It’s a difficult balance
because you need a fluid that is pumpable, but that constrains
the flash point to a high point.
Ups and downs of old school
While there are many options for advanced fluids, don’t forget
an obvious choice—water. Approximately half of the people
using lab chillers to cool down glassware just use water. This
fluid is inexpensive, non-toxic, and inflammable. It might grow
some algae, but as long as you clean it regularly, damage to
equipment should be limited.
Old school, though, is not always the best, especially when
it comes to heat capacity. Water requires the most energy to
change its temperature, compared with a water-antifreeze
mixture or silicone oil. In general, a water-antifreeze mixture
requires about 10% less energy to change its temperature than
water does, and silicone oil takes even less energy: only about
50% as much as water. In many cases, researchers select the
fluid based on the amount of heat it will extract rather than the
temperature range.
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 Bath & Chiller Resource Guide

So when it comes to keeping lab processes cooled off just right, fluids will do. To pick the best chiller fluid for a particular
the fluid might matter more or less than some researchers application, a scientist must consider the desired temperature
envision. For many circumstances, the old standby—water—still range, energy requirements, safety, and so on.
works just fine. In other circumstances, only more sophisticated

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Lab Manager 6
 Bath & Chiller Resource Guide
Bath and
Chiller Design
Derives from
Both Capacity
and Utility
How design features in the latest baths and chillers
make life easier in the lab
By Brandoch Cook
Baths
The water bath is both the most ubiquitous, and sadly the
most forgotten, piece of research laboratory equipment. If
your laboratory space is anything like the suite I’m in, you
may even still have the same holdover model from about 1987
backed into a corner, with the crusted asterisk of tape over the
temperature dial warning potential meddlers: Do Not Touch.
While indestructible and inarguably useful, these bellwethers of
established laboratories can also be as frustrating as the appendix
or the pinky toe. We know they are there for an evolutionary
reason, but we don’t notice them until neglect or abuse mark
them as glaring and tragic vestiges in an otherwise sleek body.
For example, if you have assigned lab jobs to your personnel,
and the water bath designee has forgotten to clean them and
apply germicide, chances are high that any contamination you
discover in your tissue culture reagents, or sensitive molecular
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biology experiments, is coming from those baths. Alternatively,
if someone walks by and bumps the dial with her elbow, they
may inadvertently change the temperature dramatically.
Now your enzymes or your thawing vials of precious cells are
cooking instead of making their contributions to science, and
by the time you notice, it will take a couple of days of tinkering
with the dial to get it back to exactly the right place. (Note:
always keep an accurate thermometer in any bath, and check it
before you put any reagents or samples in there). Conveniently,
it turns out that the technology advanced to digital temperature
control many years ago. Moreover, bead-based baths emerged
around a decade ago, mitigating much of the maintenance and
contamination worries associated with water baths. Although
retail prices are higher, the cost of replacing a water bath with a
bead bath is often less than the cost of lost time and reagents due
to one contamination event.
Like water baths, bead baths allow temperature control of
reagents and samples from ambient to 100°C. The switch from
water to thermal, non-uniform, metallic alloy beads, however,
creates an ergonomically favorable situation in which tubes,
vials, and flasks can stand upright with openings and cap threads
well above the surface of the heating medium, with no potential
for seepage into or out of those containers. Bead baths also
eliminate the need for liquid germicides, removing potentially
powerful environmental and biological pollutants from their
inevitable disposal and distribution through the water cycle.
The dry medium obviates the risk of splashback hazards when
baths are hot, or burn hazards when heated steel reservoirs
need to be dumped and refilled. Instead, beads are in principle
eternal, with no need to replace or clean them other than an
intermittent ethanol spray. The near future of the technology
may include the introduction of novel alloys that allow
compatibility with temperatures greater than boiling, in a way
that can compete with the greater scalability and temperature
control of circulating baths. Correspondingly, there may be
forthcoming changes in bead design to better mimic the heat
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 Bath & Chiller Resource Guide

transfer and bath uniformity properties of water so that the depth
and volume of beads have less of an impact on discrepancies
between gauge temperatures and measured temperatures.
Chillers
A chiller, in its simplest iteration, removes heat from a liquid
via vapor compression or a refrigeration/absorption cycle, and
circulates the chilled liquid to cool associated equipment, samples,
or another effluent stream. Similar to an air conditioner, its cooling
power is measured in BTUs, representing the amount of heat
removed over time. Chillers are, of course, more versatile and the
scale of cooling needed in the laboratory, medical, or industrial
environment is a consideration unique to the experiment being
done or to the equipment requiring temperature control. Chillers
can be used by any biomedical laboratory to precisely specify a
low temperature for a given experiment, such as optimizing
DNA ligations at 16 degrees. However, their power and versatility
come into better focus as temperature control modules for
expensive and sensitive equipment. Such equipment includes
electron microscopes and LC-MS apparatuses that exude and
would otherwise trap heat in closet-sized rooms, as well as MRI,
particle accelerators, and experimental lasers that function
optimally within narrow temperature ranges.
calculations are relatively straightforward, when customizing
chiller solutions, you should expect your product rep to be able
to accurately complete them for you and develop an appropriate
design solution.
Chiller optimization also requires analyzing available space and
how chiller configurations fit within that footprint. Additionally,
this includes an assessment of whether air-cooled or water-
cooled configurations are best, and whether a benchtop chiller
is adequate, as they typically provide a maximum of 4000
BTUs (1/3 ton or 1051 Watts). Because air-cooled condensers
release heat directly to the surrounding environment, they are
generally more suitable for large laboratory spaces—confined
equipment rooms therefore will normally necessitate water-cooled
condensers. Customization of chillers to associated processes or
equipment implies a vast potential for scalability. Accordingly,
one configuration can faithfully maintain temperature control of
miniscule enzymatic reactions, while another can preserve the
function of production equipment in industrial facilities.
The principles of function and the nature of end-user needs have
driven the design of both baths and chillers. At opposing ends
of temperature control, they offer scaled, precise, and affordable
options for laboratory, medical, and industrial capacities.

Because of this wide variability in chiller applications, calculations

to determine power needs are necessary to optimize solutions
and obtain the right sizes and configurations. Although these

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