Team:UESTC-China/safety
Project Safety
➤ CHASSIS:
The chassis we used are E.coli (DH5a) and A.tume (EHA105)which all belong to RISK LEVEL 1, meaning that they are low risk for human being and environment. The material we used in our laboratory is tobacco leaves, which is nontoxic to our bodies.
➤ PARTS:
Our parts are all taken from the RISK LEVEL 1 organisms, so they do not contain any virulence factors. Therefore, the parts in our project are no harm to human/animals/plants.
➤ EXPECTED PROTECTION MECHANISM:
The risks of our project are about the antibiotic resistance genes in case of the accident of incorrectly operation. However, it’s not uncontrollable. We plan to add a “suicide gene” leading the bacteria to express endolysin to kill themselves whenever they escape our cultivate medium. And we have a plant culture room that one person in charge to make sure they can’t escape to the wild.
➤ IN THE FUTURE:
In order to ensure biology safety, we will induce AdCP(BBa_K1537027)gene into our plans in the future because of its capability to lead to pollen abortion. At the same time, chloroplast transformation will be taken into consideration to avoid gene flow and improve gene expression.
Male sterility systems can be used as a biological safety containment to prevent horizontal transgene flow. We already have this gene. Besides we will express Arachis diogoi cysteine protease (AdCP) under the strong tapetum-specific promoter (TA29) which we also have.
The chloroplast is a pivotal organelle in plant cells and eukaryotic algae to carry out photosynthesis, which provides the primary source of the world’s food. The expression of foreign genes in chloroplasts offers several advantages over their expression in the nucleus: high-level expression, transgene stacking in operons and a lack of epigenetic interference allowing stable transgene expression. In addition, transgenic chloroplasts are generally not transmitted through pollen grains because of the cytoplasmic localization. And it meets the requirement of biosafety of iGEM. In the past two decades, great progress in chloroplast engineering has been made. So in the future work, we will tranform the genes into the chloroplast of plants.
Lab Safety
➤ DISPOSAL:
To avoid the pollution of environment, we gather all cultivate medium with bacteria and sterilize them before discarding. For some reagents with health risk, such as EB, we use them carefully with the correct position and keep another separate container for hazardous waste. In order to keep our laboratory safe and clean, we carry out regular cleaning, sterilization, and disinfection every day. Besides, we also check out the electrical installment and instrument to ensure safe experiment and environment. And we have a plant culture room that one person in charge to protect our plants to make sure they can’t escape to the wild. There is an inoculation room, where we handle the tobacco leaves. There are four super clean benches, which are sterilized by UV before we use.
【High-Pressure Steam Sterilization Pot】
【plant culture room】
【illumination incubator】
Researcher Safety
➤ TRAINNING:
We had a lesson about lab safety provided by the university biosafety office in our freshman year. In this lesson, freshman can learn the correct experimental operation and much knowledge about chemical drugs and reagents. And the students who pass the final safety test will accept a diploma, with which one may enter the lab and start experiment.
➤ OPERATION:
Our experimental operation strictly in accordance with the guidelines:
Laboratory coveralls, gowns or uniforms must be worn at all times for work in the laboratory；
When some volatile toxic reagents are necessary, we will operate in the fume hood;
All reagents have designated position and must returned after experiment;
A variety of drugs and reagents must be signed a clean label including the name, concentration, specification, etc;
➤ IGEM SAFETY FORM
