Would you rent your lab equipment?
Virtual sharing and equopment loans are making access to vital research tools easier
Equipment is so central to research that physics historian Peter Galison ranks tools as a greater driver of scientific revolutions than ideas. Yet that importance can be very frustrating when you can’t afford to buy the tool you need.
Like many scientists, Tobias Wingbermuehle experienced this problem when doing research at the German Sports University in Cologne. Therefore, when his friend Niklas Friedberg came to him with the idea for an online marketplace where equipment owners could offer other scientists access, he immediately saw the potential. Together they founded the London-based platform Clustermarket, which provides access to a community of researchers willing to collaborate in this way.