Dear Jim,
there are several things what could help.
If the pieces fly all over => try cut the pieces in a small drop (20ul) of water
In addition to sticking and flying around => use an ionizing air blower or a static ionizing bar to reduce all charging of plastic and other stuff (can get it from SIMCO in Hatfield USA or others I guess)
Big headaches => try cutting them under an illuminated magnifier
Hair and other things => try working as much as possible in a laminar flow or why even not work in an Class 10.000 clean room; beside of the traditional wear gloves all the time and buy only highly purified chemicals.
I guess you'll easily reach below 1 pmol then.
Hope this info is of any use.
Regards,
Tony H.
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Dr. Ing. Houthaeve Tony
VIB
Dept. Med. Prot. Research
University Gent
K.L. Ledeganckstraat 35
B-9000 Gent
Belgium
tel. (32) - 9 - 264 52 91
fax. (32) - 9 - 264 52 93
Tony.Houthaeve@RUG.ac.be
http://allserv.rug.ac.be/~thouthae/
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