Construction of a Sterilized Zone in a Food-science Laboratory: The Assemblage Process of a Knowledge Infrastructure

• In Event: 262 - Section on Science, Knowledge, and Technology Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 03.

Abstract

Studies of laboratory science have shown that scientific knowledge is contingent, situational, and accomplished in a particular environment. Exploration of the construction of a knowledge infrastructure sheds light on the precondition of knowledge production. Focusing on food-contamination and food-safety issues, M-lab practitioners set up sterilized zones in which practitioners are able to conduct their experiments. A sterilized zone could be understood as an example of a knowledge infrastructure, a precondition for working with bacteria for producing knowledge. Based on one and half year ethnography, this article examines an assembling process of a sterilized zone as a network of tools, objects, and bodies and explores the enactment and mediation of a knowledge infrastructure by heterogeneous components. Furthermore, the study shows that a sterilized zone is stabilized within the organizational context of a laboratory while contributing to the maintenance of social order in the laboratory.

Author

• Tsai-Yen Han, Rutgers University