In case your answer is "yes," how would you represent them (in terms of weight) in the estimates?

The hypothetical scenario is that I have 3 biological setups designed to test the same hypothesis (say, 3 cancer cell cultures of the same line being exposed to equal doses of a candidate agent). The results will be measured spectrophotometrically, and I decide to run each setup 5 times in the machine to get absorbance readings (which will be the technical replicates for each setup).

I have seen studies that only consider the biological replicates (making the effective n = 3), but a concern here is choosing 1 of the 5 readings as estimate for each 1 of the 3 setups. Other studies, on the other hand, consider both the biological and technical replicates in reporting variability (making the effective n = 15), but at least one issue here is "weighing" those estimates.

If you were facing such a scenario, how will you go around these issues? Thanks!

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