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Do you have other ideas on how to deal with safety or security issues that could be useful for future iGEM competitions?
In the course of our participation in this year's iGEM competition we have compiled some suggestions of ways in which to improve biological safety.
The sooner BioBrick systems are created that increase the biological safety and security, the higher the chance probably is that large environmental impacts resulting from (un)intentional release can be prevented. While the Registry of Standard Biological Parts (RSBP) keeps getting new BioBrick parts, actual BioBrick devices are able to be constructed. The complexity can give rise to an increase in failures. We think “BioBrick safety systems” –BioBrick systems that would initiate biosafety and security measures in case of inadequate lab conditions– are implicated by Biosafety engineering. These BioBrick safety systems would be able to undo any harmful consequences as a result of a failure. We also posted a proposal for a BioBrick safety system. Suggestions like this are unlikely to be found if no team is searching for it actively. Because we hope it would gain the sustainability of standard biological parts in Synthetic Biology, we suggest a modification of Best Human Practices Advance special prize into a new track: Advance of Human Practices.
Some instructional videos already have been placed in iGEM 2011 Resources; it might be good for some recapitulation on safety issues to provide “safety instructional videos” on this page. We suspect this is already planned. Development of the following safety tool, however, could be an addition to the agenda. For the sake of environmental safety concerns, it might be appropriate if “environmental impact kits” would be available to future iGEM teams. Environmental impact kits would be: Practically sized (transparently) enclosed environments harboring representative organisms of various environmental niches to which a BioBrick system could be added to monitor its survival ability. Such a kit would especially be important to test BioBrick systems that are intended to be used in the environment.
Furthermore the biosafety at iGEM could be improved if BioBrick parts with significant operational risk would be provided separately by the Registry of Standard Biological Parts. In continuation of this principle, the biosafety and biosecurity might be improved if a new user of the Registry of Standard Biological Parts had to add contact details about their Biosafety board or officer. Upon the request of a high level risk BioBrick part the Biosafety supervisor could automatically be asked for permission then. Only after permission of this board or officer the Registry of Standard Biological Parts then would send the BioBrick part.
Finally, we envision that understanding of the public should come with knowledge. It might be beneficial for the development of Synthetic Biology and of society if the general public would be allowed to follow and monitor projects closely. Probably even more if this is as close as joining a day in the lab. Unfourtunately, such "lab tours" would decrease the safety in regard of human health and the spread of disease. Video monitoring of the lab work seemed a good alternative to us. Allowing the general public to follow Synthetic Biology by live video should make the research area less strange to the public. As familiarization arises, the risk perception of the public should be lowered (Markus Schmidt, 2011; Jump to References). Our team has set this up and it can be found on the Social Media page. In combination with the, freely available, Wiki information pages of iGEM it could be possible for the public to test if any concerns about ‘Synthetic Biology’ were right or exaggerated. In order to provide the possibility of noting any –in this case: nuanced– concerns people should be able to add these on a Wiki page especially arranged for it. This page should give a clear overview of comments about projects. Synthetic biologists could give answers to questions on this site. This direct possibility of interaction should reduce the feeling of missing hold on Synthetic Biology and, with it, fear about it. With outreach our team furthermore tried to contribute to make the public more aware of the actual content of iGEM and partly Synthetic Biology. As understanding should come with knowledge, involvement should come with understanding.
We hope these ideas give rise to a growing improvement on iGEM and Synthetic Biology in general.
