A precision liquid hydrogen bubble chamber with rapid cycling capability and a photographed volume of 150 × 70 × 50 mm3 has been constructed to study short-living elementary particles. Its refrigeration system is operated with liquid helium. The chamber body, manufactured from the polycarbonate Lexan®, is almost free of vibrations due to the innovative expansion system with two pistons operating in opposite directions. The chamber operates with 5 ms cycle time and a rate up to 30 s−1. The chamber has already been cycled 6.7 million times and about 0.3 million pictures have been taken. At the hydrogen temperature of 29.8 K a track density of 150 bubbles/cm has been achieved with bubble diameters of 25 μm.

The THERMOmax TM microplate reader was adapted for monitoring the growth kinetics of human leukaemic OCI/AML-2 and mouse tumour J-774.1 cell lines in continuous culture. Fluid evaporation from wells, CO2 escape and contamination were prevented by hermetic sealing of the microcultures in wells of a 96-well microplate, thus enabling the cells to grow exponentially for 72 h under the conditions of the incubated microplate reader. For both OCI/AML-2 cells, which grow in suspension, and adherent J-774.1 cells, a linear correlation was demonstrated between the number of unstained cells seeded in a given microplate well and the optical density (OD) of that well. Therefore, the OD/time curve of the culture could be deemed to be its growth curve. By the use of the linear fit equation, the actual number of the cells in the wells was computable at any time point of the assay. In the chemosensitivity test, an inhibitory effect of ARA-C on the growth of the cells could be estimated by viewing of the growth curves plotted on the screen. The maximum kinetic rates ( Vmax) of the curves in the control and the ARA-C-treated wells were compared, yielding a growth inhibition index (GII). Comparison of results of the kinetic chemosensitivity assay with those of a [H]thymidine incorporation assay revealed that the novel assay is suitable for precise quantitation of the cell chemosensitivity, is more informative and has the added technical advantage of performance without recourse to radioactive or chemically hazardous substances.