EcoCore has a range of traditional sample prep equipment such as sieves, balances, shakers, centrifuges, grinders, ovens, furnaces, and incubators.

Sample prep equipment

  • Sieves: most common opening sizes from 8 mm to 20 um
  • Drying ovens:
    • Two large (60 cu ft) and four small (6 cu ft)
    • Temperature range: ambient to 200°C
  • Lyophilizer: Labconco FreeZone 6 Liter Console Freeze Dry System
  • Grinders (for plant/soil material):
    • One ball mill for soil samples < 30 grams; can grind up to 30 samples/hr
    • One rolling mill for soil samples
    • Two bench top Whiley mills for herbaceous vegetation samples (1-100 grams)
    • One floor model Whiley mill for large vegetation samples including small woody samples
    • One Retsch grinder for mixed soil/vegetation samples (special usage fees may apply)
  • Centrifuges:
    • High Capacity: 6 liter (6x 1L bottles) up to 5000 g – can also use up to 30-50ml tubes
    • High speed: 14x 50 ml tubes up to 30,000 g
    • Medium capacity: 4 x 750 ml capacity up to 4000 g – can also use up to 20-50 ml tubes
    • Low capacity: 16 x 50 ml capacity up to 2500 g
  • Muffle furnace:
    • 2 cu ft capacity temperature range 100 to 1000°C
  • Incubators:
    • A constant temperature room at 25°C can accommodate hundreds of samples for extended time periods
    • Two small (~2 cu. ft) heat-only incubators can maintain 25-40+ °C, one medium ( ~15 cu.ft.) can maintain -10-+20oC, and two large (~20 cu. ft.) refrigerated incubator can maintain ~15-40 °C for shorter time periods
  • Two microbalances: one 6 gram-capacity and one 2 gram-capacity
  • Water extraction line:
    • To extract water from plants and soils, e.g. for 18O analyses
    • Capacity of 8 samples/day
  • A high capacity bead beater for extractions of nucleic acids or proteins
  • Chloroform fumigation chamber with vacuum pump
  • N2 drying/concentrating system