When Greg Bannard started her master’s degree in chemistry at the University of Calgary, Canada, she didn’t have an arsenal of tools available to her, so it became incredibly frustrating when equipment went missing. And, being the sort of scientist who’s picky about the kind of spatula that she uses, it could be extremely annoying when her favourite ones disappeared. After several instances of vanishing kit, she could no longer endure running around trying to find tools that had been misplaced.This inspired her to create a portable pouch that fitted into her pocket of her laboratory coat. “It’s mostly things that I ended up finding myself reaching for,” says Bannard, who now works as an industrial designer, but still keeps the pouch as a keepsake of her time in research.At the time, Bannard worked in a dye lab, studying the functionality of perylene diimide dyes for the active layers of solar cells. She packed a whole lot into the pouch: a diamond glass cutter, a carbide glass cutter, an ear curette used for working with tiny amounts of powdered dye, a test-tube holder, a pencil, a spatula, little scissors, a felt marker and an “army” of tweezers. “It was a busy lab and people needed to get their own work done,” she says. “The best way that I could get my work done was knowing where everything was.”Public-speaking tips from the experts: what scientists can learn from comics, musicians and actorsBeyond Bannard’s frustration, missing equipment can disrupt crucial scientific research. Scientists often need particular tools to keep delicate experiments on track. Momoko Takahashi, a neurobiologist at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, knows this too well. She recalls panicking when she could not find a syringe during a time-sensitive procedure involving mouse neurons. “There’s an entire domino effect that starts if one particular moment fails,” she says. “If [the experiment] is not successful, I just wasted a bunch of animals’ lives and that makes me feel really guilty.”Everyday acts of borrowing, accidental theft, mislabelling and sample moving can turn shared laboratories into crime scenes. The social-media platform Reddit is awash with scientists asking how to guard against ‘disappearing’ items and seeking solutions to track down their missing solutions. Nature spoke directly to researchers about how they protect their work, equipment and sanity without becoming the lab secret police. After all, much ‘stealing’ is done by accident or at least not with malicious intent.Prevent itPut systems in place. Scientists who spoke to Nature recounted that all kinds of equipment can disappear from the lab, from small items such as pens and pipettes, to larger and more expensive equipment such as centrifuges and computers. Many interviewees emphasized the importance of having systems in place, such as inventory lists, sign-out sheets and shared equipment guidelines, so that it’s much harder for things to vanish without a trace.Takahashi highlights the importance of centralizing organization by having official, or unofficial, lab managers and having documentation to keep track of equipment. “A lab is a small business and it should be run like a small business,” she says, noting that she has fallen into a “pseudo lab-manager” position in every lab she’s been in. “Having organizational management implemented right off the bat is crucial to making sure that everything runs smoothly.”Sandra Petrus-Reurer, a cell-therapy researcher at the University of Cambridge, UK, also stresses the importance of having a really good inventory from the start so people can track who has used specific samples. This way, if something goes missing, it’s easier to work out when and how it could have happened.Have clear procedures and usage rules. Procedure is especially important when several researchers share equipment or space. According to a PhD student in Australia, who wishes to remain anonymous, shared fridge and freezer space, reagents and fume hoods cause the most conflict in her facilities. To reduce issues in these communal lab spaces, the university has a booking system for benches and hoods. Everyone has allocated trays in each fridge and freezer, each with its own managed inventory to keep track of items and sample movements.Six tips for better spreadsheetsSome expensive machines or equipment might be funded by several labs, which can also create confusion and conflict, says George Chen, a neurologist at the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, California. Displaying who can use the equipment can make a world of difference: something as simple as a poster that explains which materials are co-owned and can be shared between labs could be enough. “Be transparent and find systems in which it’s just immediately obvious to everyone what's going on,” he says.Mark your territory. Making ownership unmistakable can help to mitigate issues. One of the first things Takahashi did when joining her current lab was to label everything. “I always tell the undergrads to initial it or write your name on it,” she says. In Bannard’s lab, each member had electrical tape of a specific colour, which they would wrap around their designated tools. Bannard’s, for instance, was green.The Australian PhD student says that having clearly labelled reagents and pipettes helps to provide clarity about what some people can and cannot use. After being accused of nabbing another lab’s antibodies, her lab started putting custom stickers on anything that was their property. Indeed, labelling something with a name only the lab group can understand can also ward off sticky fingers. “My lab group once made up code names for our cell lines, as previously our cell cultures were going missing,” she said. The thinking was that potential ‘thieves’ would not know what the code names corresponded to. She says that her group’s cells stopped disappearing after they started adding code names.You might also consider using hidden labels. A former neuroscientist at the University of Oxford, UK, who preferred not to be named so as not to reveal his lab’s method, had his own hack: “We would put some marker hidden on the inside of the hardware,” he said. “Labels can easily be removed or rubbed off if they’re visible, so by using hidden labels, we could prove that misplaced equipment was ours.”Hidden and kept under lock and key. Takahashi recommends keeping equipment in cabinets or drawers rather than leaving it out in the open where it can easily be taken or picked up by mistake. People are less likely to rifle through drawers than they are to take things from the bench, she says, noting that she used to hide her prized forceps in her drawer before she went home.And if you need an extra level of protection, the PhD student recommends getting a lockable box or container that only you, or your team, can access. Petrus-Reurer once bought a lockable fridge, both for extra space and for the appearance of limited access: “I never removed the key, but adding a bit of a physical barrier helped.”Minimize itStore separately. When equipment does go missing, there are ways to lessen the impact. Petrus-Reurer and Chen recommend keeping a second stock of everything, because commonly used items tend to run out faster than scientists can replenish them and if they get stolen or misplaced, it can further this nuisance. Chen personally keeps a secondary stash of tissue-culture plates and pipette tips in a hidden drawer. “They’re not expensive, but they just seem to always disappear from the cabinets before someone can reorder them.”Bring your own tools. Despite best efforts, tools kept communally in the lab can still go missing. “In a well-stocked lab, stuff still happens,” says Bannard. You can plan accordingly, however. Like Bannard, Chen keeps some of his own personal instruments separate, making it clear that they belong to him so that others do not accidentally — or purposefully — nab them.