Team:ULaval/Safety
Safety
Safe Project Design
Overall, our project has been designed to minimize the risk for the experimenters and the environment. In fact, the goal of the project is to detect airborne pathogens, more specifically the pathogenic viruses. However, the proof of concept that we proposed uses the model phages as PM2, MS2, PR772, and Phi6. Those are inoffensive for humans. Also, phages are lysed and not released in the environment to prevent the risks of environmental contamination.
The lysis is used to obtain genomic RNA and DNA of the phages, and potentially pathogenic viruses, to do the cell-free expression tests. There was an opportunity for DNA environmental contamination, but we make sure to dispose correctly of the leftovers of our experiments with good waste management. For RNA, it is expressed under the form of Toehold Switch and it is not able to contaminate other organisms.
The only thing that we must really pay attention to is the antibiotic resistance that is present in the expression vector. This plasmid has the chloramphenicol resistance and is transformed in Escherichia coli strains BL21 DE3 (chasses), MC1061 (cloning). If this strain transformed with the vector is released in the environment, the chloramphenicol resistance could spread in organisms. This could lead to the acquirement, for pathogen organisms, of antibiotic resistance. Nevertheless, as mentioned earlier, we applied rigorous waste management to prevent the bacteria to contaminate the environment.
To ensure that the biological waste remaining (synthetic DNA/RNA, expressed proteins, etc.) in the cartridge does not end up in the environment, we would offer a service where the cartridge would be returned to us by system users, and we would dispose of the cartridge in the same way as for each biological waste. The client could also dispose of our cartridge by their own biological waste management facilities.
The integrality of the project can be realized in a level 1 security lab and none of the biological components are pathological for humans.
Here are the facilities available at our university :
Safe Lab Work
Even though the risk of our project is minimal, everyone in the team received biosafety training, even members did not actively participate in lab work. We made sure to use only safe, non-pathogenic organisms, and when we used volatile organisms (i.e. phages) we planned to do so under biosafety cabinets. We use the Canadian Guideline for Biosafety and Laboratory Work and the Laval University Biosafety Guidelines1,2. Those guidelines are designed to minimize risk for the environment, the equipment, and the students. Moreover, we received the help of the University, that allowed us to use furnished bio-waste container to minimize environmental risk.
References
Government of Canada. Canadian Biosafety Standard (CBS) Second Edition - Canada.ca. (2015). Available at:
https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/canadian-biosafety-standards-guidelines/second-edition.html. (Accessed: 5th October 2018)
Université Laval. Service de sécurité et de prévention de l’Université Laval. Available at:
https://www.ssp.ulaval.ca/a-propos/. (Accessed: 5th October 2018)