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From 2011.igem.org

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

• researcher safety,
• public safety, or
• environmental safety?

The project ideas of the TU Munich Team 2011 do not raise any more safety issues than those which have to be considered in every molecular work. All the members of the team had to do a so called “Sicherheitsbelehrung” were we learnt handling biological material, aspects on chemicals and the circumstances at the lab we work in because they differ from institute to institute. Even though most of us have worked in laboratories before there are some aspects you can’t hear enough of. In general, the researcher should wear a labcoat, safety glasses and gloves and one should not drink, eat or smoke whilst working at the bench. The most important part however is that everybody should know at any point of the project, what he is doing, with what parts and chemicals he is working and how to handle it safely. Since we work in a S1 lab no devices should be harmful to the researches if they act with a certain precaution. The most harmful substance in the lab is CyberGreen which is used for staining agarosegels after DNA digestion and separation (used a lot in cloning steps). Here everybody should be careful, switch gloves everytime he touched something containing CyberGreen and in genereal not trying to spread CyberGreen everywhere. Our e.coli strain (xxxxxx) is derived from e.coli xxxx and is modified so it is not harmful to humans. Since nothing from the lab is taken into public and stays inside there should be no safety issues considering public or environmental safety. Used e.coli cultures and waste containing biologic material is autoclaved before throwing away so there should be no genetic modified material outside the lab.

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2. Do any of the new BioBrick parts (or devices) that you made this year raise any safety issues? If yes,

• did you document these issues in the Registry?
• how did you manage to handle the safety issue?
• How could other teams learn from your experience?

No, none of our BioBrick parts are harmful to humans or the environment. We are working with the red-light sensor and the blue light sensor combined in an AND Gate. None of those parts should survive outside the lab.

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3. Is there a local biosafety group, committee, or review board at your institution?

• If yes, what does your local biosafety group think about your project?
• If no, which specific biosafety rules or guidelines do you have to consider in your country?

Every department at TU Munich needs a safety delegate, in our case Helene Budjarek: She has no objections against the projects due to safety issues so far. In general, working with genetically modified organisms in Germany is regulated by the GentechnikGesetz (genetechnology law).

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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?

• Use uncommon restriction enzymes
• Don’t use parts containing infectious DNA with parts that can multiply/etc. without the help of a host organism (Transposons…)