Getting Started with Conspecta

Welcome to Conspecta, the unified platform for organizing, analyzing, and collaborating on scientific research. Whether you're tracking samples, analyzing microscopy images, building figures for publication, managing genetic sequences, or writing notes, Conspecta brings your whole workflow together in one place.

System Requirements

Conspecta runs entirely in your browser. There's nothing to install.

Image-heavy work is the main driver of memory usage. As a rule of thumb, plan for at least twice as much RAM as the size of the files you typically open. For example, a 4 GB LIF file is comfortable on a machine with 8 GB or more of RAM.

AI features that run in the browser benefit from a dedicated graphics card, but a GPU is not required. An internet connection is required for all features.

Create Your Account

1. Go to conspecta.bio in your browser
2. Click Sign Up and enter your email and a password
3. Conspecta sends you a 6-digit verification code by email. Enter it to confirm your address.
4. Complete your profile with your name and your role

Once approved, sign in at conspecta.bio. You can turn on multi-factor authentication later from Settings → Account for an extra layer of protection.

Your First Sign-In

The first time you sign in, you'll see a welcome dialog box with two paths:

• Got an invite coming? Open your inbox to accept a team invitation a colleague sent you. Once you accept, you land inside their team's projects.
• Exploring on your own? Start in your private workspace, which is just for you. You can create as many projects as you like there, and you can join or create a team later when you're ready to collaborate.

There's no wrong answer here. You can switch between your private workspace and any team you're a member of at any time.

How Conspecta Is Organized

Your work is organized into two levels:

Teams

A team is your research group or institution. Each team has its own members, its own projects, and its own monthly compute usage. Everyone has a private team for solo work, and you can be a member of as many additional teams as you're invited to.

Projects

Inside each team are projects. A project is a focused line of work, such as an aim from a grant, a research program, a study, an experiment, or anything else you'd otherwise keep in its own folder of files. Every project is independent: its own samples, its own notebook, its own figures.

You switch projects from the picker at the top of the left sidebar. Search across teams and projects with Cmd+K (Mac) or Ctrl+K (Windows).

What's Inside a Project

Each project contains the same set of workspaces, accessible from the left sidebar:

• Planner lets you plan and assign tasks, with protocols as templates
• Notes is for versioned protocols, methods, and results in a rich editor
• Samples tracks specimens and links them to your data
• Figures composes multi-panel figures from your charts and images
• Analysis is where you analyze microscopy images and flow cytometry data
• Genetics is for sequence analysis and annotation
• Facility lays out the physical space: freezers, shelves, and sample boxes
• Inventory tracks reagents, equipment, orders, and suppliers

You don't have to use every workspace. Start with the one closest to your work and add others as you go.

Your First Steps

1. Create or Join a Team

You start with a private team automatically. To collaborate, accept a team invitation from your Inbox or create a new team from the project picker.

2. Create a Project

Inside a team, create a project with a descriptive name that reflects your study or experiment.

3. Add Your Data

Open whichever workspace is closest to your day-to-day work. Upload images, register samples, write a protocol, or import a sequence. You don't need to set everything up before you start.

4. Bring in Your Team

Invite collaborators to your team, assign them tasks in the Planner, and use Notes' approval workflow to keep everyone aligned on protocols.

Next Steps

• Navigating the app to learn the sidebar, project picker, and global search
• Plan your experiments to set up your first task board
• Manage your team to invite collaborators and configure roles