Team:UC Davis/Safety

Before anyone even stepped foot in the lab, the team took a day long safety course run by the UC Davis Environmental Health and Safety Department. The course covered laboratory safety such as how to dispose of waste, proper laboratory wear, and chemical hygiene plans. In addition our advisors took time out of their busy schedules to show us where all the Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) were located as well as what proper protocols were used in the lab. We also learned how to safely operate all the equipment we would need for the project. By the end each team member was certified to work in a lab at the UC Davis Genome and Biomedical Sciences facility.

Most of the chemicals used in the project posed no health risks. Our substrates however (the 16 Aldehydes) had some potential of being harmful. The small concentration of aldehyde found in rancid oil poses no health risk, however when working in the lab they were in a highly concentrated form. Due to their high volatility, leaving a bottle open for just a few minutes could fill a lab with the stench of certain aldehydes. To be extra careful, we decided that all work being done with aldehydes would be done under the fume hood.

None of the biological components used were rated any higher than biosafety level 1. But even with this the team decided to be extra careful. The E.Coli used to grow our protein was constrained to only one laboratory and all items in contact with the cells was bleached and sterilized shortly after contact.