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From 2011.igem.org

Safety Questions

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

• Researcher safety
• Public safety
• Environmental safety

  NO, there are no safety issues raised from our experiment. Species of microorganisms we are going to culture or extract certain parts of genes are E. coli, Vibrio harveyi, and species of cyanobacteria. Our project does NOT handle any pathogen, toxin or infectious materials. Only carefully planned experiments and protocols will be done in the laboratory so that the possibility of microorganisms exposed to the environment undergoing transition of recombinant DNA is eliminated. Waste from the lab will be treated properly under the biosafety guideline and be discarded, preventing pollution. During our work and research in the lab, we will put on proper protective equipment when it is necessary. Also, our team will be supervised by experienced advisors.

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  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?

  We do NOT have safety issues related to the biobrick parts we are planning to make, yet. Though, in the worst situation, our plan changed to reset the protocol, no safety issues will be raise relevant to biobrick parts. All of our biobrick parts came from authorized organization.

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  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?

  YES, Biosafety Board exists in the Department of Life Science and Biotechnology, Korea University. Protocols and experiments in the laboratory are done under the guideline given by the board and also follow WHO Laboratory Biosafety Manual since there is no national guideline for biosafety yet in Korea.

  Please visit this website.

• Rules http://www.korea.ac.kr/content/K/K6_2.jsp (Korean)

• Safety and Security http://kusafe.korea.ac.kr/main.asp (Korean)

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  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?

  Giving a chance to choose protocols, experiment methods and chemical reagents to achieve each team's goal is very important issue and therefore, restricting range of choice should be avoided. Most of the teams participating in iGEM competition are aided by one or more advisors and the advisors are experts in their field of study. Every one of the advisors will have qualified abilities and experiences to guide their team safely through problems. We suggest that iGEM committee emphasize the importance of safety rules to advisors so that they may educate their undergrads of the rules.