Good quality laboratory equipment is essential for effective scientific work. As the principles used to ensure scientific research can be carried out under controlled, repeatable conditions have developed, the need for laboratory equipment that behaves in a safe and predictable manner has grown in importance. Advances in our understanding of the way materials interact with one another have also led to an improvement in the way laboratory equipment can be designed and manufactured. A good example is laboratory equipment manufactured out of borosilicate glass, which can withstand extremes of temperature and pressure more effectively than standard glass. Advances in laboratory equipment design have also resulted in new consumer goods, such as the thermos flask, based on a laboratory equipment design by Donald Dewar, and also borosilicate cookware.

Although a great deal of laboratory equipment is glassware, scientists would not be able to work effectively without laboratory equipment of many different kinds. The manufacture of high quality laboratory equipment is a specialised field. Designs have been refined over many years to create a range of standard laboratory equipment items that can meet a very wide range of scientists needs. However, there is a first time for each piece of laboratory equipment to be designed, and good quality laboratory equipment manufacturers can usually create bespoke laboratory equipment to meet individual needs. Laboratory equipment must be suitable for the task, and where standard laboratory equipment cannot meet that need, it may be necessary for bespoke laboratory equipment to be manufactured.

Laboratory equipment has an important role beyond reliability of experiment results. The safety and health of laboratory equipment users is high on the agenda of most people buying laboratory equipment, and the integrity of laboratory equipment items has a very important role to play here. Laboratory equipment in this sense will also include protective eyewear, and many other types of safety critical equipment.

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