Team:Exeter/Safety
Safety
Safety is of the upmost importance to the Exeter iGEM team and we spent a large amount of time ensuring our work was safe, both in a laboratory context as well as within any real-world applications. We worked according to strict risk assessments and COSHH forms, to ensure all members of the team were safe at all times.
A significant proportion of our team are not studying a bioscience degree and therefore have no experience of working in a biological laboratory. To ensure these team members stayed safe – education about lab safety was incorporated since day one. As part of our virtual bootcamp week we completed an online laboratory safety module and a PowerPoint presentation on lab safety. Since the COVID-19 pandemic significantly limited our lab time, we also had to complete a virtual lab induction using Labster, the online lab environment simulator.
Laboratory
Once we were allowed onto campus and into the laboratories, we all received a lab induction from researchers, covering topics such as emergency protocols, COSHH, waste disposal, aseptic technique and the appropriate use of flow hoods. We were also taught about lab access and rules (we could not work outside of 9-5 hours and had to be supervised at all times), which individuals should act as contact points as first aiders and fire wardens, biosafety levels, biosafety equipment, microbial technique, disinfection and sterilization, procedures in case of emergency, physical bio-security, personnel bio-security, and chemicals, fire and electrical safety. We were also assured that our supervisors and laboratory manager would be willing to assist with any further training.
Our experiments all took place in a category two laboratory, so we were required to follow the safety protocols that we would be required to follow if we were working with category two organisms. Despite this, in our experiments we only worked with category one organisms (generally regarded as safe): Bacillus subtilis (B. subtilis) WB800N, Bacillus subtilis (B. subtilis) 168 , Eschericia coli (E.coli ) BL21(DE3), Eschericia coli (E.coli ) DH5α , and Bacillus thuringiensis DSM2046.
COVID-19 Safety
Due to the current situation with the COVID-19 pandemic and government guidelines, the team also followed stringent rules surrounding safety on this front. We followed social distancing guidelines (with only 2 members of the team allowed in the laboratory at a time), and ensured face coverings were worn at all times. Virkon, which was placed at the end of the bays, was used to sanitise work stations before and after activities in the lab to protect our community. Hand sanitiser stations were placed along the one-way system inside the building, and both of these were explained by our supervisors to ensure they were used in the correct manner. The iGEM 2020 team acted as a social ‘bubble’ and was designated an area for us to use as a further precaution to protect our community.
Biocontainment
A great deal of thought was put into ensuring our bacteria were unable to escape. In the laboratory context, after bacterial growth all culture media and vessels will either be autoclaved or treated with the sterilizing agent Virkon so the organism should not escape. However, even if escape was possible as they are laboratory strains they will not proliferate in the environment. To ensure our final product was feasible in an entrepreneurial sense, as well as ensuring our innovation was taken in the public interest, we also considered escape of the bacteria in an applied setting. We learnt from other teams such as St Andrew’s and the City of London School that genetic kill switches were unreliable due to rapid evolution of resistance and so we had to consider further experimentation which is explored in our design page.
