The importance of open and frugal labware

Michael Drack1 , Florian Hartmann1 , Siegfried Bauer2 and Martin Kaltenbrunner1*

1
Soft Electronics Laboratory, Linz Institute of Technology (LIT), Johannes Kepler University Linz, Linz,
Austria.
2
Soft Matter Physics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Linz, Austria.
*e-mail: martin.kaltenbrunner@jku.at

George Whitesides, a professor of chemistry at Harvard University, stressed the importance of cost-
conscious science in a 2011 article in The Economist entitled ‘The frugal way’1. He argued that the
distinction between curiosity-driven and applications-driven research is a luxury not afforded to the
developing world. Healthcare was, he reasoned, a key example, stating: “Western medicine does
many things well, but it is not affordable in, or very useful to, most poor populations.” To this end,
Whitesides proposed that a technology base for affordable healthcare (and other technologies)
requires the development of science that is conscious of cost from the very beginning. Soft
electronics is an emerging technology that promotes affordable solutions in areas ranging from
healthcare to robotics. Electronic tattoos are an example of a function-specific alternative to
sophisticated epidermal devices that require cleanroom manufacturing. These devices are fabricated
using a low-budget cutting plotter2 and are capable of recording electrophysiological signals such as
electrocardiogram or electromyogram3. Likewise, hydrogel electronic skins that offer instant
assembly thanks to a superglue-like dispersion4 are a practical alternative to the equipment-intensive
production of lightweight ‘imperceptible’ sensor foils5. Alternatively, soft electronic devices that
contain stretchable microfluidic systems can combine analysis, computation and visualization in a
single device to create relatively simple and low-cost healthcare monitoring systems6. Such electronic
and microfluidic skins can also be used in soft robotics7, providing much-needed sensory feedback8.
Furthermore, widely available materials such as paper9 can be used to build electronic devices. This
can reduce complexity and lower the barrier of entry into the field, providing, for example, a route to
ultra-low cost and easy-to-recycle diagnostic tools in low-income regions of the world. Emerging
technologies based on a frugal approach could open up relatively untapped sources of creativity and
innovation from researchers living in developing economies and amateur tinkerers working in
homemade laboratories. However, frugal science still requires readily available scientific instruments.
Unfortunately, the belief that expensive lab equipment is a prerequisite for good science is still firmly
rooted in the minds of many. We disagree. Overcoming both this mental and economic barrier is a
challenge at the core of burgeoning open-source initiatives from hardware and software
communities10–16. These initiatives often provide assembly instructions, schematics and source-code,
as well as, crucially, a forum for their members. We believe that the individual researcher and the
scientific community can benefit from this mentality of openness and sharing. Global connectivity
could greatly speed up development cycles through communication with experts from various fields
and the public alike (Fig. 1a). This should reduce research costs for the individual, increase visibility
and accessibility of achievements and results, and lower the entry barriers for novices.

Accessible technology
Until around the 1960s, computers were impractically large and affordable only to a few nations. In
less than a lifetime, technological innovation driven by Moore’s law unlocked an unprecedented level
of computational power to the masses. Although many of the devices today are complex and closed,
small and affordable single-board computers from Arduino and from Raspberry Pi are available.
These simplified computers can be found not only in do-it-yourself (DIY) projects at home but also in
many laboratory set-ups17. We, for example, often use single-board computers for data collection
and processing in soft electronic skins4 or as the controller of custom-made scientific instruments for
testing material properties13. Another technology that is helping to improve access and participation
is additive manufacturing, commonly known as three-dimensional (3D) printing, which can print
virtually any class of materials18 and allows rapid turnover in design and fabrication without
expensive tooling19. In many labs around the world, 3D printers have largely replaced workshops
whenever small- to medium-scale setups are required. In particular, the computer-controlled
manufacturing of soft matter from printable materials has led to a myriad of soft electronic and
robotic systems20,21, which are often biologically inspired. The low cost of many medium-resolution
printers has made them popular among scientists and laypeople alike, sparking an actively involved
community with openly available designs and instruction sets10,22. Also under development are
affordable laser cutters that are able to cut plastics and wood with thicknesses of a few millimeters.
Such units sell for a few thousand US dollars and can additionally be used to pattern electronic
circuits on soft or hard substrates. Despite such disruptive advances in printing, cutting and other
specialized equipment, these technologies may not be readily available to everyone. Toy bricks are,
however, available to most. LEGO is a versatile interlocking construction kit that combines vast
design possibilities with intuitive handling. These are ideal prerequisites for rapid prototyping and
educational purposes. In the lab, LEGO brick-built constructions have, for example, been used as
sample holders, as low-cost replacements for optical tables and components, and to build
educational tools such as an atomic force microscope23 or a watt balance24. Because toy bricks are
produced on the scale of millions at low cost (despite their high precision), their use in building
scientific equipment represents a particularly frugal approach.

Less is more
Low cost does not have to mean poor quality. Resourcefully built hardware can meet the standards
required of scientific labware in device and materials characterization. Although commercial lab tools
are highly sophisticated instruments, they are often clad with features that are never used but are
included as a potential advantage in competition for sales. Such auxiliary features can be responsible
for the high price of off-the-shelf equipment. But tailoring basic lab tools for specific needs and
appropriate measurement ranges is often sufficient. A tensile tester for soft materials like elastomers
or gels does not, for example, have to be made of machined steel parts. Using toy bricks, we have
built a tensile tester15 (Fig. 1b) that is capable of measuring uniaxial extensions up to 30 mm at an
accuracy of 100 μ m. With this, soft hybrid electronics can be stretched, applying a maximum force of
30 N with a precision of 30 mN, while the resistances of the stretchable conductors are characterized
simultaneously. The performance of our toy-brick tester is on par with commercial tools within its
dedicated force range, and crucially at a mere hundredth of the cost. The tensile tester has a stiff
frame assembled from the manifold-shaped plastic pieces that can handle the resultant applied
forces when stretching elastomers and soft electronic circuitry; keep in mind that those test
specimens have a Young’s modulus that is at least three orders of magnitude lower than metals or
ceramics. It is not made entirely of toy bricks, however. There is also a LEGO Mindstorms processing
unit that provides motion control, a digital caliper that can measure distances, and a few custom-
built electronic pieces (seen in the upper left corner of Fig. 1b) that provide the interface to
computer-controlled data processing. A user interface is available both in LabVIEW and open-source
Java. The system uses a commercial US$150 force gauge, which is one of the most expensive pieces,
but custom-made solutions could also potentially be used here. Our toy-brick tensile tester has been
actively used in our labs for over two years without any signs of wear. In some cases, professional
tools can be impractical for research purposes. For example, equibiaxial mechanical stretching of
samples performed using industrial equipment requires samples that are huge compared with the
small central area that undergoes uniform stretching. This is not always desirable in research, where
costly samples are typically prepared manually in small sizes and quantities. We addressed this issue
with a custom-made radial stretching device14 (Fig. 1c). Our device uses an iris-like mechanism that
ensures a large uniform area of stretching. The design is more complex and accurate than typical
approaches. However, we were able to keep costs low as we used a combination of 3D printing and
laser cutting for most of the structural parts. An Arduino single-board computer is then used to
control the system and link it to a desktop computer running a LabVIEW user interface. The
integrated 50 N force gauge allows mechanical characterization of materials with various
measurement options such as single- and multi-cycle procedures. The desktop-sized radial stretching
device is lightweight and easily transported. All instructions for both systems with a list of parts and
the complete code are available to download for free14,15. Indeed, several groups around the world
have now built their own toy-brick tensile tester and radial stretching device and improved on the
designs. For example, magnetic sample clamps have been developed to ease and speed up the
exchange of test specimens. We are now working on a next generation of compact, application-
specific tensile testers that enhance specialized equipment such as vacuum systems and climate
control chambers with in situ electro-mechanical characterization.

Outlook
Our hope is that with advances in frugal technology, an open-lab platform can ultimately be
developed for areas all across science, providing detailed instruction sets for the reproduction of
high-quality tools and the dissemination of results. This could help us to benefit from untapped
creative potential from across the world, and particularly from growing economies. Such platforms
could improve research and also science education — helping to train new generations of scientists,
who can speed up cycles of innovation by being able to communicate with skilled experts in diverse
disciplines. Electronics research is particularly well suited to this approach, as it already combines a
diverse range of areas including materials science, engineering and computer science. Emerging
fields such as soft electronics and robotics can be the seeds of this new thinking and will benefit from
an open-minded culture of sharing within the scientific community.

Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the European Research Council Starting Grant ‘GEL-SYS’ (grant
agreement no. 757931) and a start-up grant of the Linz Institute of Technology (grant agreement no.
LIT013144001SEL).

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Fig. 1 | Open labware for soft electronics and robotics. a, Sharing designs and instruction sets allows
people from all around the world to participate and contribute to the development of open-source
tools, as well as to science itself. b, Lab-grade toy-brick tensile tester built almost entirely from LEGO
pieces. c, Radial stretching system made with laser-cut acrylic parts and 3D prints, and powered by
an Arduino single-board computer. Panel b reproduced from ref. 12 under a Creative Commons
licence CC BY 4.0.