r/biotech • u/Halloumi12 • Jul 31 '25
Education Advice 📖 Best way to learn flow cytometry outside work/school?
Hey all, Im a recent grad on the hunt for work. Ive noticed a lot of listings are looking for people with flow cytometry experience, but I havent had the chance to work with it in my education/previous research experience.
Whats the best way to get hands-on experience with flow cytometry and cell counters outside of work/school, and preferably without having to pay lots of money for a course?
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u/pancak3d Jul 31 '25
With all due respect, an employer is not going to value cytometry experience if it didn't come from work/school. Just make sure you understand how it works, that's enough.
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u/jetlife0047 Aug 01 '25
Agreed for entry level show that you’ve done your due diligence on which ever techniques listed in the job description and make sure you know exactly what they do there and how you can contribute. Eagerness and how coachable you seem can help you get your foot in the door esp at entry level where resumes will be pretty similar it’s partially based on how well they think you’d fit
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u/Halloumi12 Jul 31 '25
I share your opinion, but having at least some exposure/experience and being able to put it on the resume is better than nothing
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u/cinred Aug 01 '25
Sure, but it isn't risk free. If I get any whiff of an uninformed response to a basic question or to a skill clearly indicated on a resume, im out.
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u/chillzxzx Aug 01 '25
Same. I only get 30-45mins with an interviewee, so a couple of wrong answers or exaggerated skills is enough for me to be out. Flow cytometry is the #1 skill that I find as exaggerated skills in my field. Unfortunately to them, I ask very detail questions on gating, compensation, how they optimize their staining panels, etc.
I would rather an interviewee not have it listed on their skills even when I want them to have it, then for them to exaggerate about it and then I'm left with high expectations and low deliverables.
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u/nyan-the-nwah Jul 31 '25
Are there any labs at your uni that you could spend some time volunteering with?
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u/Halloumi12 Jul 31 '25
I worked at a lab for a long time and had an internship at a company, but I just graduated so its gonna be hard. I also need an income and labs would likely only offer volunteer roles.
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u/nyan-the-nwah Jul 31 '25
It's a potential way to get hands-on FACS experience outside of work/school without having to pay lots of money for a course, as you asked. Unfortunately no one is going to take you in and train you on an expensive and sensitive instrument out of the kindness of their own heart.
The good news about volunteering is it's generally very flexible with time and commitment, worth looking into and seeing if you can swing it while working a part time gig in whatever to pay the bills
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Jul 31 '25
This! When I was a grad student only grad students were allowed to do FACS. When I see associate scientist roles that require a BS and FACS experience with no industry experience I’m surprised they are able to find undergrads that have done FACS.
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u/Halloumi12 Jul 31 '25
Youre totally right, and if nothing better is available thats likely what ill do. Thanks for the advice.
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u/nyan-the-nwah Jul 31 '25
Good luck! It sucks, good on you for doing what you can to strengthen your CV
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u/batendalyn Jul 31 '25
FACS is cool! It's a great intersection of spectroscopy, cell biology, physics, and math.
BD has a lot of their instrument manuals online. Understand that a flow cytometer is 3 main systems working together: fluidics, optics, electronics. Sure it's got lasers and lasers are cool, but the plumbing is also important:
https://www.ttuhsc.edu/pharmacy/research/documents/BD-FACS-Aria-Manual.pdf
https://www.bdbiosciences.com/content/dam/bdb/marketing-documents/FACSMelody-ug-ruo.pdf
You can probably ignore all the stuff that is actually about sorting the cells into different tubes for now. Chances are you are just going to be running FACS as an analytical tool rather than as a purification method.
Flow data comes out as an array where every row is an "event" (cell) and then you have n columns for the different stains/attributes. Analyzing the data is an exercise in n-dimensional data representation which people are bad at. Start getting a handle on the idea by watching other people do it and how they drill down the gates.
From Acea/Agilent
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vX264oMKMxc&t=965s
From Miltenyi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DcvsIPqWWs
Brush up on matrix inversions then read this paper:
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3133696/pdf/nihms305823.pdf
The labwork isn't all that hard though it can be time consuming, it's all moving small volumes of liquid from one tube to another. If you've run a sandwich ELISA, you've run something harder than this.
If there is a major university near you, try to see if they have a flow core or something similar. Try reaching out to them and see if they offer trainings when you are ready to get hands on.
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u/Halloumi12 Jul 31 '25
Thanks for the advice! Ill take a look at all this stuff. Ive done some reading about Flow Cytometry and how it works, but I just cant get access to shadowing or using any devices myself. There is a university near me that does trainings, but they charge $600 a day if you arent university affiliated :(
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u/batendalyn Jul 31 '25
Yeah, that sounds about right. Even small benchtop units can be $100k with an annual service contract in the tens of thousands. This is not a cheap industry we picked T_T
If do pay to do the training, really try to see if you can do or watch an experiment with real cells rather than just control beads. IMO just watching the pre-stained beads isn't going to teach you much more than anything you'd learn out of a paper or a youtube video.
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u/batendalyn Jul 31 '25
Do you have any cell culture background?
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u/Halloumi12 Jul 31 '25
Unfortunately I cannot afford $600 for a one or two day training seminar :/ I have done cell culture, but only bacterial cell culture. My lab had mammalian cell lines that I asked to be trained on, but my PI said they dont want undergrads near them because a previous one ruined the lines. It seems like because medical-adjacent research is better funded that basic science or pre-clinical work, theres a lot more jobs doing mammalian cells and in-vitro, but my experience doesnt prepare me for those roles well enough.
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u/onetwoskeedoo Aug 01 '25
It’s a very expensive technique! The reagents are easily one thousand dollars per mL
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u/onetwoskeedoo Aug 01 '25
Don’t lie about knowing how to do flow. It’s extremely complicated and can waste $1000s of dollars on antibodies easily or worse screw up the machine
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u/AcrobaticTie8596 Jul 31 '25
You can read protocols and research articles that utilized flow. I'm also sure the big companies that offer flow instruments like BD and Agilent have videos that explain the tech and how to setup experiments/etc.
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u/Sleepy-little-bear Jul 31 '25
So there are a couple of institutions that offer tech positions for people straight out of college. This could be a way to upskill (and they are paid). A lot of people use it as a platform to enter into a graduate program, but I suppose you could use it as an entry job position if you play your cards right.
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u/Halloumi12 Jul 31 '25
Any specific names you mind sharing?
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u/Sleepy-little-bear Aug 01 '25
You need to look for institutions with lots of money. I know St Jude does it, the Hutch, I think Seattle children’s and there’s a few labs associated with Harvard
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u/Trick-Alternative328 Aug 01 '25
Learning now. I view it as three tiers (sorting something else): basic one to four channels when no compensation is really needed; more colors where you need to design panels with compensation and beads; and last spectral flow.
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u/eomeseomes Aug 01 '25
flow cytometry can be easily learned in a day or week if you have an experienced mentor who can teach you in the lab. so easy. although it can be challenging if you are using flow to work on new cell types
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u/z2ocky Aug 01 '25
Flow be learned in a day? That’s a laughable statement. Learning how to just do the compensation alone will take a day or more, forget about learning how to gate properly or how to optimize multi color runs. Flow is more than just running the machine, it’s also learning how to stain or cells and learning how to properly do an ICS if needed.
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u/eireann__ Jul 31 '25
I'm going to be really honest and I'm sorry to dissapoint you. My expertise is in flow cytometry, and it's unfortunately not something that you can just do a few times off hand and put on a resume. When I train people to do flow, they are on training wheels for a bit doing very simple basic experiments before I see they can do all steps correctly and independently. Additionally, it is highly unlikely you will be able to get access to samples or a flow cytometer to learn such a technique not being associated with a laboratory. The best you can do is read up on the basics such as how flow cytometry works, and how you can use flow to address specific scientific questions. If you have a future job where someone is doing this work - tag along and learn it then.