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The first step on the way to safety is to understand what synthetic biology is, and all of its inherent risks. These days, no global definition of synthetic biology exists. Our team got involved in activities aiming to spread knowledge and debates on the subject. According to the ETC group (a Canadian Action Group on Erosion, Technology and Concentration), synthetic biology is “ the design and construction of new biological parts, devices and systems that do not exist in the natural world and also the redesign of existing biological systems to perform specific tasks”. Thus, scientists must reflect on the consequences their actions can have. In order to diminish the impact of experiments on the environment, new concepts were imagined: Biosafety and Biosecurity. Biosafety is the prevention of unintentional exposure to the pathogens and toxins, or their accidental release. Biosecurity is prevention of loss, theft, misuse, diversion or intentional release of pathogens and toxins.(1)

Would any of your project ideas raise safety issues in terms of:

-researcher safety,
-public safety, or
-environmental safety?

Researcher safety.
Of course we are aware that laboratory work usually comes with some risks and we took those risks into account during our  practical work. Thus, all our experiments were carried out using E. coli DH5alpha as the host organism, a strain that is non-pathogenic (class 1 micro-organisms). The vectors and biobricks we used did not confer any pathogenic nature/characteristic to the host strain. For more information about researcher safety, see also answer to question 3.

Public safety.
During the course of an experiment, we made sure members of the general public didn't have access to the lab by keeping the door locked. In any case, the system as constructed now has no public safety issues, as the host, vectors and biobricks are all non-pathogenic.

Environmental safety.
We kept in mind that any bacterial modification creates the risk of genetic transduction to other bacteria. Therefore, it can have consequences we are unable to anticipate. We thought about the impact our experiments could have on the environment. The biobrick we have constructed does not raise any environmental issues. Furthermore, one of the potential applications we thought of for our system is a “suicidal bacterium” that would bring along its own death outside of a specified temperature range centered around the temperature at which the bacterium is grown in the laboratory, preventing its spread in the environment.

(1)World Health Organization. 2004. Laboratory biosafety manual. Third edition. Geneva

Question 2:

Our BioBrick is a composite of others BioBricks, none of which raise any safety issues. Indeed, our BioBrick is made of a regulatory part upstream of the operon coding the synthesis chain of Lycopene, an iniquitous compound found in tomatoes and already used in E.coli by many others teams without any problems. Furthermore, our system could be used by others teams in order to reduce the chances of organisms spreading in case of accidental dissemination. (see below).

Question 3:

There is, in every department of the Université Paris-Sud, a comity in charge of hygiene and security. Consequently, the Institute of Genetics and Microbiology, location at which we performed our experiments, has a bureau in charge of hygiene and security whose GMO section is directed by one of our instructors: Jean-Luc Pernodet. His presence in the team helped us think of the dangers linked to disseminating GMOs into the environment, as well as ways to resolve these problems. We also learned about the rules specific to the room we were conducting our experiments in with the person in charge of the laboratory (gas usage, handling of BET (ethidium bromide), processing of chemical and biological waste...).

We also payed attention to the security memorandum and signed the hygiene and security charter of the Institute of Genetics and Microbiology: <a href=”https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B7le4ncI8B16WEhHblpoQ0pHYUE”>Security memorandum.</a> <a href=”https://docs.google.com/open?id=1g8Ysi5s_eJLtHO2xM9SfbjbBu39sqSsV9EmktUDO_wZ6YvBByqqJbUxL_Jtt”>Hygiene and security charter.</a>

All experiments were carried out according to French Safety Regulations.

Question 4:

Our project has applications that could potentially contribute to improving safety in the field of synthetic biology. Indeed, we could replace the lycopene operon by a gene encoding a toxin, which would would provoke the bacterium's death if grown outside a predefined temperature range. This would avoid contaminating the environment with GMOs. Thus our project could help us keep the laboratory clean. At a larger scale, our project could allow us to preserve the environment and therefore may also help mitigate people's negative views of synthetic biology.