Team:NRP-UEA-Norwich/Safety Forms

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         <h1 style="padding-bottom:10px;margin-bottom:0;">Safety Forms</h1> <h2> </h2>
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         <h1 style="padding-bottom:10px;margin-bottom:0;">Safety Form</h1> <h2> </h2>
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<fieldset>
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<legend class="qnum">Your Training</legend>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">a)</span> Have your team members received any safety training yet?</p>
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<ul style="margin-left: 0em;">
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<li>Yes, we have already received safety training.</li>
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</ul>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">b)</span> Please briefly describe the topics that you learned about (or will learn about) in your safety training.</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="8" id="learned_in_training" data-form-field="learned_in_training">Training in School safety procedures; training in good microbial and general laboratory practices. Familiarity with risk assessments including but not limited to GM, microbiology and those for specific techniques such as agarose gel electrophoresis.
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General safety training included information about safety and emergency procedures, available safety equipment and emergency exit protocols. The risk assessments included information about handling of waste and the disposal routes to be used in regards to various chemicals, micro-organisms and damaged apparatus such as glassware. </textarea>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">c)</span> Please give a link to the laboratory safety training requirements of your institution (college, university, community lab, etc). Or, if you cannot give a link, briefly describe the requirements.</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="4" id="inst_training_requirements" data-form-field="inst_training_requirements">The University of East Anglia (UEA) provides general safety advice and guidance, with specific details focusing on laboratory experiments. Specific information is provided on the UEA Intranet site, but an overview of general health and safety practice is available at: https://www.uea.ac.uk/uss</textarea>
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</fieldset>
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<fieldset>
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<legend class="qnum">Your Local Rules and Regulations</legend>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">a)</span> Who is responsible for biological safety at your institution? (You might have an Institutional Biosafety Committee, an Office of Environmental Health and Safety, a single Biosafety Officer, or some other arrangement.) Have you discussed your project with them? Describe any concerns they raised, and any changes you made in your project based on your discussion.</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="8" id="inst_biosafety_officer" data-form-field="inst_biosafety_officer">The University of East Anglia (UEA) has several staff who have roles that are dedicated to dealing with all health and safety services at the institution. The Faculty of Sciences at UEA has a designated Safety Committee, which is manned by a range of administrative and academic staff who have a a specific focus on their duties. The School of Biological Sciences at UEA has a senior member of academic staff that oversees safety procedures for microbiological experiments and another who focuses on Genetic Modification studies. We have had discussions about our project with these various staff members and they are content that appropriate safety procedures are in place.</textarea>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">b)</span> What are the biosafety guidelines of your institution? Please give a link to these guidelines, or briefly describe them if you cannot give a link.</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="5" id="inst_biosafety_guidelines" data-form-field="inst_biosafety_guidelines">The University of East Anglia (UEA) provides biosafety guidelines, with specific information provided on the UEA Intranet site at:
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https://intranet.uea.ac.uk/uss/intranet/Microbiological+Safety+Rules and https://intranet.uea.ac.uk/uss/intranet/GM+RA+Summary+of+Requirements. An overview of general health and safety practice is available at: https://www.uea.ac.uk/uss</textarea>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">c)</span> In your country, what are the regulations that govern biosafety in research laboratories? Please give a link to these regulations, or briefly describe them if you cannot give a link.</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="1" id="national_biosafety_rules" data-form-field="national_biosafety_rules">http://www.hse.gov.uk/biosafety/gmo/law.htm</textarea>
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</fieldset>
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<legend class="qnum">Risks of Your Project Now</legend>
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<p class="qbody">Please describe risks of working with the biological materials (cells, organisms, DNA, etc.) that you are using in your project. If you are taking any safety precautions (even basic ones, like rubber gloves), that is because your work has some risks, however small. Therefore, please discuss possible risks and what you have done (or might do) to minimize them, instead of simply saying that there are no risks at all.</p>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">a)</span> Risks to the safety and health of team members, or other people working in the lab:</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="10" id="lab_worker_risks_now" data-form-field="lab_worker_risks_now">Transmission to laboratory personnel is a potential hazard although there is no recorded precedence with the Escherichia coli strains that we will use.
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The Agrobacterium tumefaciens strain GV3101 to be used is is a disarmed strain that lacks a functional tumour-inducing plasmid and instead contains a defective plasmid (dTi) that provides the necessary 'vir' gene functions for T-DNA synthesis and secretion into plant cells. Agrobacterium tumefaciens is not known to be harmful to humans.
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Good laboratory practice and knowledge of the risk assessments should minimise all potential risks to laboratory personnel.
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</textarea>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">b)</span> Risks to the safety and health of the general public (if any biological materials escaped from your lab):</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="5" id="public_risks_now" data-form-field="public_risks_now">The E. coli and A. tumefaciens hosts to be used have unknown colonising potential but have no recorded pathogenicity. The laboratory strains used are likely to be less fit to survive in the environment than wild type strains meaning that the potential risk of harm or infection to the general public is reduced. In the event of accidental release into the environment, no realistic implications are predicted.</textarea>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">c)</span> Risks to the environment (from waste disposal, or from materials escaping from your lab):</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="8" id="env_risks_now" data-form-field="env_risks_now">The ability of the E. coli and A. tumefaciens strains to survive in the environment is unknown. However, it is likely that the laboratory strains used are not as fit to survive in the environment compared to wild-type strains and therefore pose less of a risk.
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Genetically modified plants can horizontally transmit DNA to unmodified neighbouring plants of the same species, causing potential contamination of the un-modified food supply. However, as all experiments involving agrobacterium will be confined to plant growth rooms, the risk of contamination to the environment is reduced.</textarea>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">d)</span> Risks to security through malicious mis-use by individuals, groups, or countries:</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="4" id="security_now" data-form-field="security_now">There are no known serious implications accociated with accidental release of the E. coli and A. tumefaciens strains as the laboratory strains used are less fit than wild-type strains or have no known pathogenicity. There is no forseeable malicious use for these strains that could cause a security threat.  </textarea>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">e)</span> What measures are you taking to reduce these risks? (For example: safe lab practices, choices of which organisms to use.)</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="14" id="reduce_risks_now" data-form-field="reduce_risks_now">Good laboratory practice and implementation will minimise risks. This will include restricted access to authorised workers, ensuring that all areas are swabbed with a recommended disinfectant, no laboratory clothing allowed outside of the laboratory and all outdoor clothing will be stored in offices. All contaminated waste will be autoclaved.
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To reduce DNA transmission to neighbouring plants, the genetically modified plants will be confined to the laboratory and will be autoclaved after use. Any experiments involving Agrobacterium tumefaciens in transient expression experiments in Nicotiana benthamiana will be conducted in plant growth rooms that provide the necessary level of containment for infiltrated plants. All plant material in these growth rooms (whether infiltrated or not) will ultimately be destroyed by autoclaving in accordance with our institutional safety requirements.   
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The strains of E.coli used are not known to be pathogenic and are laboratory strains that have less chance of surviving in the environment than naturally occurring, wild-type strains. </textarea>
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</fieldset>
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<legend class="qnum">Risks of Your Project in the Future</legend>
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<p><strong>What would happen if all your dreams came true, and your project grew from a small lab study into a commercial/industrial/medical product that was used by many people? We invite you to speculate broadly and discuss possibilities, rather than providing definite answers. Even if the product is "safe", please discuss possible risks and how they could be addressed, rather than simply saying that there are no risks at all.</strong></p>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">a)</span> What <i>new</i> risks might arise from your project's growth? (Consider the categories of risk listed in parts a-d of the previous question: lab workers, the general public, the environment, and malicious mis-uses.) Also, what risks might arise if the <i>knowledge</i> you generate or the <i>methods</i> you develop became widely available?</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="4" id="future_risks" data-form-field="future_risks">Transmission of DNA into neighbouring crops could cause a problem regarding contamination of the food supply.  However, if we were to apply for a field-testing licence then our genetically modified plant biosensor would be prevented from reproducing and therefore would cause no forseeable problems in regards to transmission to neighbouring crops.</textarea>
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<p class="qbody"><span class="qnum">b)</span> Does your project currently include any design features to reduce risks? Or, if you did all the future work to make your project grow into a popular product, would you plan to design any new features to minimize risks? (For example: auxotrophic chassis, physical containment, etc.) Such features are not required for an iGEM project, but many teams choose to explore them.</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="2" id="minimize_future_risks" data-form-field="minimize_future_risks">If the project reaches the stage of being tested in the field, the plants would be prevented from reproducing to prevent gene transfer to neighbouring plants.</textarea>
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</fieldset>
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<legend class="qnum">Further Comments</legend>
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<p class="qbody">If you are completing a Preliminary Version of your Safety Form, use this space to describe how far you have progressed in your project, and give some comments about any questions that you left blank.</p>
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<p class="qbody">You can also use this space for any other comments or additional material.</p>
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<textarea cols="100" rows="3" id="further_comments" data-form-field="further_comments">Level 1 constructs have been made using golden gate cloning and transformed into E. coli. These are now ready to be transformed into Agrobacterium tumefaciens GV3101 for use in in transient expression experiments in Nicotiana Benthamiana.</textarea>
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</fieldset>
        
        

Revision as of 14:39, 10 October 2014

NRP UEA Norwich iGEM 2014

Safety Form

Your Training

a) Have your team members received any safety training yet?


  • Yes, we have already received safety training.

b) Please briefly describe the topics that you learned about (or will learn about) in your safety training.



c) Please give a link to the laboratory safety training requirements of your institution (college, university, community lab, etc). Or, if you cannot give a link, briefly describe the requirements.


Your Local Rules and Regulations

a) Who is responsible for biological safety at your institution? (You might have an Institutional Biosafety Committee, an Office of Environmental Health and Safety, a single Biosafety Officer, or some other arrangement.) Have you discussed your project with them? Describe any concerns they raised, and any changes you made in your project based on your discussion.



b) What are the biosafety guidelines of your institution? Please give a link to these guidelines, or briefly describe them if you cannot give a link.



c) In your country, what are the regulations that govern biosafety in research laboratories? Please give a link to these regulations, or briefly describe them if you cannot give a link.


Risks of Your Project Now

Please describe risks of working with the biological materials (cells, organisms, DNA, etc.) that you are using in your project. If you are taking any safety precautions (even basic ones, like rubber gloves), that is because your work has some risks, however small. Therefore, please discuss possible risks and what you have done (or might do) to minimize them, instead of simply saying that there are no risks at all.


a) Risks to the safety and health of team members, or other people working in the lab:



b) Risks to the safety and health of the general public (if any biological materials escaped from your lab):



c) Risks to the environment (from waste disposal, or from materials escaping from your lab):



d) Risks to security through malicious mis-use by individuals, groups, or countries:



e) What measures are you taking to reduce these risks? (For example: safe lab practices, choices of which organisms to use.)


Risks of Your Project in the Future

What would happen if all your dreams came true, and your project grew from a small lab study into a commercial/industrial/medical product that was used by many people? We invite you to speculate broadly and discuss possibilities, rather than providing definite answers. Even if the product is "safe", please discuss possible risks and how they could be addressed, rather than simply saying that there are no risks at all.


a) What new risks might arise from your project's growth? (Consider the categories of risk listed in parts a-d of the previous question: lab workers, the general public, the environment, and malicious mis-uses.) Also, what risks might arise if the knowledge you generate or the methods you develop became widely available?



b) Does your project currently include any design features to reduce risks? Or, if you did all the future work to make your project grow into a popular product, would you plan to design any new features to minimize risks? (For example: auxotrophic chassis, physical containment, etc.) Such features are not required for an iGEM project, but many teams choose to explore them.


Further Comments

If you are completing a Preliminary Version of your Safety Form, use this space to describe how far you have progressed in your project, and give some comments about any questions that you left blank.

You can also use this space for any other comments or additional material.


A big thank you to our sponsors

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