Team:ULB-Brussels/Safety

From 2011.igem.org

Safety

Would any of your project ideas raise safety issues in terms of: researcher safety,
public safety, or environmental safety?

Since our project doesn’t involve producing dangerous products, nor any modification that could be pathogen, there is no evident issues concerning public or the researcher’s safety , except the well-known risks of all molecular biology researches.
The direct modification of the genome of the bacteria could allow more resilient phenotypes which we will take into account and discuss with our human science colleagues.

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

<p>The recombinase and flipase could allow unintended genome modifications, which is why we are implementing strong control over their expression.

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

Yes, there is a biosafety committee specific of the ULB Institute of Molecular Biology and Medicine, which is our host lab. This committee authorizes or refuses any new project to be carried in the institute, including end of studies works and thesis, which is routine, except if the project includes, for example, the manipulation of pathogenic organisms.

If yes, what does your local biosafety group think about your project?

Since all the DNA parts we designed were already used, in different projects in our host lab, our project was considered routine and was not subject to any specific decision of the committee. We didn’t have special presentations to do or forms to fill and obtained quite automatically the authorization to manipulate.

            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?

Perhaps potential pathogens or environmentally problematic parts should be referenced, with a dangerousness rating, based on a standard classification.
More drastically, having a standardized cell death system that could be easily implemented in any cell or project presenting safety issues could be helpful.

Safety

Please use this page to answer the safety questions posed on the safety page.