Scientists share the most dangerous things they work with. Acid, lasers, snakes—the laboratory isn't always a safe haven.

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Peril in the lab.
Rafael Alvarez
▼ You might expect scientists to encounter hazards out in the field. But laboratories aren’t safe havens either. We asked researchers about the most dangerous things they work with.
1. Liquid Helium
↑Jenny Ardelean, graduate student in mechanical engineering at Columbia University
To study the intrinsic properties of materials like atomically thin semiconductors, we need to get rid of heat, which causes subtle vibrations and makes our data fuzzy. We use liquid helium to cool substances to minus 453°F, a bit warmer than space. Our lab pipes it through a closed system to avoid having to transfer—and risk spilling—the expensive liquid. If that happened, the helium could evaporate, burn off your skin, or displace oxygen so you’d suffocate.
2. High-powered laser
↑Donald Umstadter, director of the Extreme Light Lab at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln
My lab develops imaging techniques using the Dio­cles Laser, which produces a beam roughly 1 billion times more intense than light on the surface of the sun. But with proper training, it’s actually very safe because we focus it in a pulse that’s less than a trillionth of a second long, in an area roughly a millionth of a square meter, and keep it all inside a closed box. Someday we even hope to supplement traditional X-rays with less-­radioactive Diocles imaging.
3. Snake Venom
↑Jeffrey O’Brien, recent doctorate in chemistry from the University of California at Irvine
Antivenins work for specific species. Our lab ­decided to make one from nanoparticles that inhibit the toxins of many types of snakes. To test it, we ordered about 15 venoms, which we stored in a frozen box marked with a skull and crossbones. These samples come from the world’s deadliest reptiles, such as the black mamba, so they must not get into your bloodstream. Even when you’re weighing out the freeze-dried powders, you’re hyperfocused. (▪ ▪ ▪)

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