Lambda Hack Basel — a two-day hackathon in Basel's most advanced and affordable DIY Laboratory
Full rules, schedule, and tracks: www.lambdabiolab.com
What it is
A two-day hackathon at Lambda Biolab on Riehenstrasse 14 — Basel's most advanced (and most affordable) DIY lab. Wet lab, dev, robotics, lab equipment hacking, or bring your own project. Pick alane and build something real. Free to attend. Space is limited; registration closes when we hit capacity.
The five tracks
Wet Lab — Clone, transfect, engineer. BSL-1 bench with cloning reagents, enzymes, and cell lines from Lambda Biolab stock. Every wet-lab entrant gets 2 weeks of bench access after the event tofinish their results.
Dev — Protein structure, docking, directed evolution, autonomous agents. 32-core i9 + RTX 4090 on-site (shared, time-sliced), plus cloud GPU credits for heavier workloads.
Robotics — Build, wire, actuate. 3D printers available throughout the event.
Lab Equipment Hacking — Crack open the black box. Reverse-engineer firmware, protocols, and hardware on real lab instruments.
Bring Your Own Topic — Continue an existing project at the intersection of biology, hardware, or data science. Declare it in the registration form.
What you get
Full lab access across both days
Claude and OpenRouter API credits
Per-track prizes: vast.ai GPU credit, Starship Factory access, Lambda Biolab bench membership, Bolt or Vercel Pro
Wet Lab teams: 2 weeks of bench access after the event + two-phase judging (Best Plan on Sunday, Best Result 14 days later — 1 month free bench membership per prize)
The rules, in one line
Public Git repo under an open-source license, BSL-1 only, no viral vectors, PPE at the bench, and you own your project (AI assistants welcome — you drove the design).
Logistics
Where: Lambda Biolab, Riehenstrasse 14, 4058 Basel
When: May 16–17, 2026
Cost: Free