Spatial and Temporal Inhomogeneity of Magnetic Background in Cell Culture Experiments: The Role of Type and Position of CO2-Incubator in a Laboratory

In vitro cultivation of cells in strictly controlled conditions of a biological incubator is a widely used experimental model in biological studies. The CO2-incubators allow control of temperature, atmospheric composition, and humidity; however, the recent reports point out at possible significant and incontrollable influence of incubators on magnetic background. We demonstrated that two types of CO2-incubators sufficiently alter the static magnetic field (SMF) in the inner chamber compared to natural geomagnetic field, and the effect depends on the incubator model. The values of SMF in the center of incubators chambers were lower than natural; nevertheless, the strongly expressed spatial inhomogeneity of SMF was registered, with both reduced, up to hypomagnetic, and increased SMF values. One of the incubators in operating mode generated oscillations in magnetic field with period of oscillations about several seconds and peak-to-peak amplitude depending on the measuring point within the chamber volume, up to 115% of the mean value. Since the magnetic background is considered to contribute in multiple biological effects, we emphasize the significant impact of CO2-incubators on magnetic background in cell culture experiments and assume that its spatial and temporal inhomogeneity may be a source for variability in cell study results. HighlightsO_LICO2-incubators sufficiently alter the static magnetic field in the inner chamber compared to natural geomagnetic field C_LIO_LISpatial inhomogeneity of the magnetic field depends on CO2-incubator type and can reach the gradient value of more than 60 T. C_LIO_LIIn one type of the incubator, the generated oscillations in magnetic field were registered with a period of several seconds and a peak-to-peak amplitude up to 115% of the mean value. C_LI