Preventing moisture condensation on Petri dish lids

Kramer, Mateja (author), Ranogajec, Slaven (author), Panov, Pane (author), Begeš, Gaber (author), Hudoklin, Domen (author)

Moisture condensation on the lids of Petri dishes (PDs) during incubation is a common issue in microbiological laboratories, which affects microbiological water quality testing. This research focuses on the condensation problem during the use of Reasoner’s agar (R2A) in water testing for pharmaceutical applications. Condensation can distort microbial colony counts that potentially compromise the reliability of test results. The findings presented in this work are limited to the investigated incubation conditions and R2A agar systems. We conducted a detailed investigation into the factors contributing to condensation, particularly temperature gradients and relative humidity within vertically stacked PDs during incubation. Our experiments revealed that condensation is primarily driven by temperature differences between adjacent PDs, with higher condensation levels forming in dishes at the top of the stack. We explored various strategies, including improved air circulation and thermal insulation, but found that horizontal stacking of PDs effectively prevented condensation. These findings offer a viable method to enhance the accuracy of microbiological testing in pharmaceutical environments by mitigating moisture-related issues.

• Language: English
• Keywords: Petri dishes, condensation, microbiological water testing, reasoner’s agar, incubation conditions, temperature gradients
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FE - Faculty of Electrical Engineering
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2026
• Number of pages: 9 str.
• Numbering: Vol. 37, no. 23, art. 235802
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-185006
• UDC: 621.317:579.67:543.3
• ISSN on article: 0957-0233
• DOI: 10.1088/1361-6501/ae74ff
• COBISS.SI-ID: 285431811
• Publication date in RUL: 20.07.2026

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Measurement science & technology
• Shortened title: Meas. sci. technol.
• Publisher: IOP Publishing
• ISSN: 0957-0233
• COBISS.SI-ID: 6000901

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: Petrijevke, kondenzacija, mikrobiološko testiranje vode, Reasoner agar, inkubacijski pogoji, temperaturni gradienti