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Revision as of 21:21, 6 January 2017

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SAFETY POLICIES

As it is at the forefront of what is technologically possible, iGEM also comes across important policy issues on a continuing basis. In 2017 iGEM has clarified its positions on:

Gene drives

Policy discussions around gene drives center around whether they should be released into the environment and under what safety provisions should research be carried out. iGEM has a strict do no release policy – this applies to gene drives as well as any other projects. On the use of gene drives as research tools in iGEM projects, the policy is:

Gene Drives are not allowed in iGEM projects without a special exception from the Safety Committee

Teams will need to convince the Safety Committee that:

  • There will be no environmental release - This is existing iGEM policy for all projects and not just on gene drives.
  • That the project is safe - The Safety Committee will evaluate your project proposals with reference to host organism (chassis), modifications (including any associated parts) and containment measures.
  • Your team is implementing and adhering to the measures proposed by Akbari et al in “Safeguarding gene drive experiments in the laboratory”
  • Your team has notified the Safety Committee that you are considering or planning to use gene drives in your project and you and your faculty advisor have participated in a mandatory conference call with experts on drives and on safeguards.
  • Any orders for commercially produced genetic material placed by your team must be screened for regulated sequences.
  • None of your parts submitted to the registry contain a functional gene drive – a drive in a single part will not be accepted and this can have implications for medal criteria.
      • For the purposes of iGEM, a gene drive includes Cas9 (and other endonucleases, such as dCas9 and Cpf1) integrated into the genome (including through the use of gRNA) of a sexually reproducing eukaryotic organisms (including organisms that reproduce both sexually and asexually, such as yeast) and/or the use of a drive to impact the progeny.