Electronic Laboratory Notebook Software?

By chris_leonard at Thu, Nov 2 2006 7:59am |

In my neurobiology lab we currently use a mixture of the traditional laboratory notebooks and electronic logbooks, excel and filemaker databases to keep track of our experimental work... Not all of out data fits nicely into any of these formats .... (e.g. images taken with our photomicroscope). Consequently, the workflows are not as well documented as I'd like and we oftern spend a large amount of time finding all the data related to paticular experiments. I would love to move to a server based lab eNotebook that would allow integration of these various datatypes, allow searching and allow linking back to the primary data files, even if just through hyperlinks. Most importantly I would like it to promote a more uniform documentation practice by each lab member. So, are there commercial products for this purpose? Are they any good? Are there open source options? What do you use and do you like it? Are there products for this in development? What should the requirements be like for such an app?

Thanks
-Chris

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Thu, 2006-11-02 08:49 — drc

Electronic Notebooks

I spent a considerable amount of time looking at electronic notebooks some time ago. The majority work fine provided you are willing to change your workflow to fit in with the vendors idea of how you should work! I would strongly suggest you spend some time documenting your preferred workflow and then seeing which would suit you best. The demos are usually very impressive and it is only when you get down to details you find problems. Do you need documentation for regulatory approval (21CFR 11)?

With the next version of MacOSX however Spotlight searching of remote servers will be easier so you might find that vendors look to make use of that. If you have access to a webobjects enthusiast you might find that you can build your own relatively easily.

Here is a list of starting points

www.scrip-safe.com/Patent.html
www.censa.org/index.htm
www.sibio.net/
www.rescentris.com/
www.circusponies.com/
www.ornl.gov
www.itg.lbl.gov/~ssachs/doe2000/ENResearch.html
www.emsl.pnl.gov:2080/docs/collab/intro/elnotebooks.html
www.ornl.gov/Press_Releases/archive/mr19970107-01.html
www.epm.ornl.gov/~geist/java/applets/enote/
http://softbook.com
www.symyx.com/page.php?page=276
www.rocketebook.com/enter.html
www.chemexper.be/main.shtml
www.hallogram.com/index.html
www.icebreaker.com/index.asp
www.documentum.com
www.doxis.com

Thu, 2006-11-02 19:55 — chris_leonard

Electronic Notebooks

Thanks for your speedy reply... I'll take a look at these links. I also found the following which looks interesting since it is extensible and supports certain useful datatypes for us. OTOH, it seems quite expensive.

http://www.axiope.com/solutions_electronic_lab_notebook_overview.html

Mon, 2009-04-13 15:05 — invasifspecies

Electronic Lab Notebooks

Electronic Laboratory notebooks (ELNs) are becoming increasingly popular and important because of government regulations such as 21CFR11, which specify how records must be created, digitally authenticated and archived in order to be admissible in legal or regulatory proceedings. One example of a modern ELN that is optimized for life-science research is CERF by Rescentris Inc. CERF is both Mac and Windows compatible and fully 21CFR11 compliant. It includes advanced features such as semantic metadata searches and customizable access permissions that help PIs to manage and track all the activities in a modern lab staffed by many scientists working on different problems. CERF recently added software-as-a service remote server hosting, so it is no longer required for labs to maintain their own dedicated server in house. Sign up for a free webcast demo of CERF at www.rescentris.com.