My lucky little embryos

At 8:35 am the lights flickered briefly. The last two weeks have been funny with the construction on the street next to us. It made the microscopes shake and vibrate. It’s not easy to read morula stage embryos when the scope vibrates. Then the lights flickered again.

Then the lights were out. Everything went out. Including the incubators. The lady upstairs, who owns the sushi restaurant, is arguing with the street construction crew right now. Smoke is coming out of the manholes. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured.

There’s no music in our lab – I was listening to a Azumi Inoue CD. Our phones are also out so I can’t call any clients to alert them. The network is out too. But I still have three hours on my laptop battery. Maybe I do need a cell phone after all.

There are over a thousand bovine embryos in the incubators that will expire in the next several hours if the power does not return. A thousand little cows are in the cold right now.

At 9:05 am we are told it will be a whole day before the power is restored. My poor tiny embryos. I don't think Heat Shock Protein 70 will be enough to save you.

At 10:45 am the power returns!! What about the incubators?

CO2: 4.2% TEMP: 38.5C SYSTEMS OK

Oh my lucky little embryos!