The lab on Pandora Street is a clear reference of the myth of Pandora's Box, where all humanity's evils were contained and then unleashed.
The Silence of the Lambs is credited with inspiring several of the themes used in season 1 of the X Files. In this episode, when Mulder & Scully are talking to Captain Lacerio, Mulder questions why there would be 3 different law enforcement agencies hunting a man who was originally stopped for a moving violation, to which Captain Lacerio responds, "I know it's not Silence of the Lambs, but it's what we do".
The "purity control" sample Mulder finds in the lab and gives to Scully is actually in an Erlenmeyer flask (hence the title). However a flask for biological samples would have a screw-cap closure, not a ground-glass stopper (like the prop shown). The latter type of stopper can't protect biological samples from contamination by environmental bacteria.
Ken Kramer, the doctor in the lab in this episode, is a reoccurring actor in the series, this being his first of three appearances.