Introduction and pointers

General
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Hi everybody,

I wanted to introduce myself, and ask for some pointers and directions to navigate this community to which I am very new.

My name is Simon, I have been working as an electronics engineer for a year, developping low-weight animal trackers for science. On top of that, I have a personal interest in bio-electronics, and I have been tinkering on and off on a few projects on my own, despite my very limited biology knowledge. At the moment, I am re-thinking about my algae bioreactor in order to see how much I could push the automated analysis with more advanced imaging or sensing. I am interested in open-hardware initiatives, the values and the work that is being done.

  1. While the forum is very nice, I see a lot of affiliated websites, links, other communities and forums such as Hackteria, all a bit scattered on the internet bur deeply interweaved : I would like to contribute, make hardware and tinker with the community on projects that matter, but I really struggle to find information on how to get to there. Any, pointers, open projects, ideas that need custom hardware ? I live close to Zurich, and a big community center is there, is it possible to pop by or meet people from the community there ?

  2. Are there paid positions in europe that would allow me to work on specific open-hardware projects and allow for more of a “think, design, tinker, build, iterate” kind of position compared to the industry ? If so, any places and plateforms where you would look ?

Thank you all for reading.

Looking forward to engaging with you, online or in person !

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Hi Simon!

Welcome to GOSH, and thanks so much for this introductory post. My name is Jamaica Jones - I am the Community Coordinator. As you may see referenced in another recent thread, we are in the process of revising our welcoming reosurces and practices so, in the meantime, I am super glad that you reached out with the questions that you have.

As the Community Coordinator, I can speak mostly to the community generally and would rather allow others to weigh in about regarding their individual projects and platform/resource recommendations. Regarding the community, it is distributed by nature. GOSH is a community of folks are are located and working around the world, but who have shared interests and values such as those you’ve shared here.

Very shortly, we’ll be spinning up some new opportunities to get connected across the community. You might keep an eye out for an opportunity to get engaged in the Peer Exchange Pod, which will bring together a group of folks who are interested in designing and hosting Peer Exchange opportunities throughout the next few months.

In the meantime, I am happy to set up a one-on-one call if that would be helpful to get you oriented - I’ll reach out about that via DM. Locally, I hope that others in the general Zurich area might chime in - @dusjagr, are there any resources or pointers you might share?

Cheers,
Jamaica

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Good to meet you! Some of us work or dabble in that area. I’ve done passive acoustic monitoring and have an interest in HAB detection in relation to my AUV project. Your algae reactor sounds intriguing.

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Thank you for the nice welcoming message @jamaica

I would definetely be interested in getting a clearer picture of the community and branches.

Moving to your DMs.

Thank you too for reaching out @Harold , nice to meet you. Your projects sounds super interesting !

What size and cost of AUV are we talking about ?

I have also looked up what they use for the HAB detection and monitoring, sounds like great but fancy instruments. Maybe some can be made with custom boards for much cheaper.

I want to see how much insight I can get on living cyanobacterias with low-maintenance sensors and low-cost. Completely new field to me, so lots to explore. My idea at the moment is just to get optimal conditions to grow Arthrospira jenneri (aka spirulina), and as much insight as possible in the culture media and the cyanobacteria. Temp, pH, maybe iron levels, basic spectrometry etc. if you have experiences with sensors or advices on the biological part, I would be super happy to get in touch with you.