Safety questions:
1. Would any of your project ideas raise safety issues in terms of: researcher safety, public safety, or environmental safety?
Researches could raise safety issues in terms of researcher safety, public safety or environmental safety, but we take our efforts to minimize such risks.
First, the major part of our project is in silico simulation, which will cause little researcher safety, public safety or environmental safety issues.
Second, during our wet-lab experiment, we took several trainings on laboratory safety issues, which include standard experimental operation, emergency management and biosafety instructions. Such trainings will guarantee researcher safety, public safety and environmental safety.
Third, the E.Colistrain and plasmid used in our wet-lab experiment is highly commercialized which is bought from bioengineering company. Genes used in our wet-lab experiment are got from iGEM competition or bought from bioengineering companies. Highly commercialized and widely used issues usually have little safety risks. So, the strains, plasmids and genes we used will raise little researcher safety, public safety and environmental safety problems.
2. Do any of the new BioBrick parts (or devices) that you made this year raise any safety issues?
None of the parts we constructed this year raise any particular safety issues that we can foresee. Biobrick are made based on standard parts got from iGEM competition and commercialized parts got from companies. So, there is little potential risk in raising any biological safety issue.
3. Is there a local biosafety group, committee, or review board at your institution?
Yes. The biosafety issue of our project is under the supervision Department of life Science, Tsinghua University. Our protocols are submitted to the supervisors and advisors to evaluate if there is potential biological hazard. We also had several trainings on laboratory safety issues given by the lab manager during our project.
4. Do you have any other ideas how to deal with safety issues that could be useful for future iGEM competitions? How could parts, devices and systems be made even safer through biosafety engineering?
When it comes to the issue of biosafety, instructions are necessary. For the iGEM competition, safety manual should be sent to all the teams together with standard parts. Also, online courses on laboratory safety issues should be provided. Teams registered should be required to read the safety manual and take the online courses before they conduct their project.
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