Team:Stony Brook/Safety
Safety
Our Lab and Equipment
During the year, our team worked in a laboratory in the Centers for Molecular Medicine at Stony Brook University. Our lab is BSL-1 and has a Class IIA2 biosafety cabinet. While performing lab work, we made sure to have the correct personal protective equipment (PPE), such as nitrile gloves, long pants, and lab coats. We used the corresponding waste procedures set by Stony Brook University to properly dispose of biohazard waste and liquid waste.
Our Training
To prepare for working in the lab safely, every member of the team completed a Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) on responsible conduct of research. Every member of the team also completed safety courses through Stony Brook University. These courses included dealing with hazardous waste (ENV 001), chemical hazards (ELS 002), biological hazards (ELS 003), and regulated medical waste (ENV 005). For more information on these courses, please refer to here.
Our Organisms
All of our organisms that we worked with are BSL 1 level organisms. Our strains of Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Escherichia coli (strain DH5-alpha) are both standard chassis used in labs. The strain of Agrobacterium tumefaciens used (strain GV3101) is known to not cause tumors in humans, making it better to use for lab work. Our plants used (Nicotiana benthamiana) were also harmless to humans.
Working with Viruses
To reduce the risks when working with viruses, we made sure that special precautions were put in place. First, the plants were grown in one growth chamber, and the plants were infected with the virus in a separate growth chamber. This contained the virus to one place. Fresh gloves and personal protective equipment were used whenever handling the viruses. A separate cart was also used just for plants infected with TMV. This is to reduce the risk of the virus being spread to other plants in the area. The virus is BSL 1, so there is no risk for human use.
Safety and Ethical Concerns
Our experiments are closely related to genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Therefore, there are some ethical concerns regarding GMOs. To perform this transient expression assay, horizontal gene transfer through Agrobacterium was used. However, this has the concern of spreading genes to different plants, which is a scary idea to the general public. Additionally, the idea of having an enzyme found originally in yeast being put into plants that will eventually be consumed is also a scary prospect. Based on feedback, we analyzed the implications of having this idea being released into the market in our integrated human practices.
