Researcher Safety in Everyday lab

Each undergraduate experiment is completed in the synthetic biology labs of the Department of Biotechnology in National Chiao Tung University. The labs strictly follow all the institutional, local, and federal regulations. Prior to working in the standard level 1 facilities, all members are required to attend mandatory experimental and laboratory safety training, which provides a general understanding of primary and secondary barriers in the lab. All access of non-members is restricted by the usage of IC card. The laboratory head of biosafety is BoBo (balderdash034@gmail.com).

Biosafety Level 1 (Lowest Level)

Safe Agents

• Consistently present minimum potential danger to laboratory workers and environment
• Rarely cause ailment in immunocompetent adults

Safe Lab

• Bench tops are waterproof and resistant to moderate heat, organic solvents, acids, alkalis, and chemicals
• Special containment equipment: biological safety cabinet and laminar flow cabinets are used
• General building not typically secluded
• Yearly Laboratory Inspection Passed

Trained Lab Personnel

• Given training on specific procedures
• Signed a commitment form to comply with the regulations
• Secluded from general building
• Supervised by a trained microbiologist and several advisors

Implemented Standard Microbiology Practices

• Mechanical pipetting (not mouth pipetting)
• Safe sharps handling procedure is given
• Avoidance of splashes or aerosols
• Decontamination of
  • Work surfaces when experiment is complete and regularly
  • Spills (immediately)
  • Infectious materials before disposal (autoclaving)
• Personal hygiene
  • Hand washing after handling materials, removing gloves, and prior to leaving the laboratory.
  • Eating, drinking, smoking, and wearing contact lenses are not permitted
• Standard protective equipment is usually worn (gloves and lab coat)
  • Latex gloves are mandatory when there is a cut or rash present on hands
  • Laboratory coats worn to prevent damaging of street clothes
  • Protective eyewear worn when experiments might have splashes of microorganisms or other similar situations.
• Biohazard signs are posted and access to the lab is limited by IC cards

Experimental Training

Before joining the crew, the majority of our personnel have never or seldom heard of synthetic biology or iGEM. Only five senior students have isolated plasmid before. Therefore, a combination of hands on and lecture based training is scheduled and taught by senior researchers before the personnel is granted permission to use the lab. Handouts of standard procedure were also given and followed.

Laboratory Safety Course

The members of the 2015 NCTU_Formosa team major in numerous assorted fields, such as biotechnology, transportation and logistics management, nanotechnology, and applied chemistry. This diversity means that the majority are new to synthetic biology experiments. For basic safety precautions, all members must participate in and pass a series of laboratory safety courses held by the Environmental Protection and Safety Center http://esc.nctu.edu.tw/ . The safety module includes general lab and occupation safety, biosafety in the laboratory, and general biohazard courses. These courses educate and test participants about general biosafety principles, knowledge of proper conduct, dressage, waste disposal, emergency response and procedure, etcetera.

Unusual Experiments

For safety, we hope to have a constant, stable fluorescent intensity while restricting the E. coli to the maximum. Our first safety experiment involves paraformaldehyde. Since our labs rarely use paraformaldehyde, we learnt the preparation process from the Internet.

First, we have to change the paraformaldehyde powder to its aqueous form. The laboratories that we were used were all synthetic biology focused, not chemistry focused. This results in insufficient equipment and fume hood space to fit the hot plate. To fix this, we substituted the beakers to Eppendorf tubes and the hot plate to dry heating pad. In the first trial, the Eppendorf burst open and liquid flew out. Thankfully, we wore our lab coats, masks, gloves, and safety glasses. However, we soon discovered that by borrowing Eppendorf safety clips from another professor’s laboratory and reducing the heating period could prevent the Eppendorf from fully bursting and was able to bar the liquid from boiling.

The next stage is to dilute and store the chemical. For dilution, we allocated enough space in the fume hood, reducing the risk of this experiment. chemicals were stored in a 4˚C refrigerator, since the substance usually runs out in less than 3 days. We also discovered that the chemical is light sensitive and wrapped aluminum foil around the casing. These progressive adjustments for this untried iGEM experiment helped to reduce the laboratory risks for others and ourselves.

Unusual Experiments

In all honesty, the definition of unusual differs from person to person. As a result, we decided to list a couple of incidences.

Safety Issue 1
Problem: Too many people in the lab room at once causing unnecessary collisions
Solution: Make and abide to a schedule

Safety Issue 2
Problem: The improper addition of TAE buffer, instead of TBE for electrolyte solution, when using TBE gel
Solution: Thoroughly wash the electrophoresis machine and properly dispose of the gel

Safety Issue 3
Problem: The suspected contamination of test tubes (walls have white rings)
Solution: Have the personnel on duty wash the test tubes first with detergent and water. Then, rinse with distilled water.

Safety Issue 4
Problem: Ultra violet light is constantly turned on in the laminar flow machine
Solution: Insure the UV is turned off after 30 minutes of use to ensure safety to others as well as to ourselves.