Project Design Safety
People who use drugs need to abide by basic guidelines and behavioral regulations to prevent harm to themselves, the public environment. This may deal with any (potentially) harmful hazardous substances or chemical substances so that people need to follow guidelines and norms to prevent harm to themselves, the public or the environment.
Our project design attaches great importance to safety. Firstly, we use E.coli Nissle 1971 as our chassis organism. E.coli Nissle 1971 has been put into the application of tumor treatment before, and there have been relevant and reliable researches on the treatment of intravenous injection into human body. Therefore, E.coli Nissle 1971 is not harmful to the individual or the environment, and its safety performance is effectively guaranteed. It is guaranteed that this project does not use any other organisms as expression vectors. In addition, the contents of the project we design, including ELP, AMP and TLR are all protein structures with no enzymatic activity, and their functions are relatively specific, so they will not cause any potential harm to the human body or the environment. All the plasmids constructed in the project are harmless to humans. Based on relevant professional knowledge, we have also assessed the risk of the bacteria transfected with our plasmids entering the environment and we believe that the risk is relatively low. At the same time, the design content of the project does not involve any animal experiments and human testing, so there are no bioethical safety issues.
Laboratory Work Safety
Laboratory buildings include emergency exit locations, emergency ventilation systems, fire fighting equipments, first aid kits, etc., all of which are familiar to us. After recruiting new members every year, we spent several weeks training them on basic laboratory operations and how to handle safety incidents. A lab coat, gloves, and glasses are required everytime when we enter the laboratory. All culture fluids and culture media containing bacteria were properly treated and then discharged to the designated location to prevent potential biological contamination. We handled all biological materials, wastes and equipments in strict accordance with BSL-1 requirements. At the same time, the laboratory is also equipped with professional hazardous and waste biological products operators who will properly handle all waste.
In addition, we completed the specified experimental tasks in the specified laboratory space to avoid cross-contamination. Before each experiment, we would be familiar with the experiment process carefully, and if necessary, pre-experiments would be carried out to ensure that there should be no errors in the experiment process and potential experiment safety problems. In addition, we had undergone rigorous training in the use of any test equipment, especially high-pressure steam sterilizers, high-speed centrifuges and other instruments with higher safety risks. In addition to professional and detailed training, we would ensure the safe operation of the instruments before leaving, and regularly check and clean the instruments and facilities to reduce the probability of occurrence of hazards. Before leaving the laboratory, we check and turn off all water and electricity equipments, and close doors and windows to ensure safety.
Safety Policies
In terms of Human Practice Research, we visited many related companies, such as BestCare-Bio and Best Carrier, and conducted in-depth interviews with professionals, such as Dr. Yamin Zhang from Tongji Hospital affiliated to Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan. From the specialists we consulted, we were told that our design is effective enough to put into practice which also made us think our safety protocols to be reliable. Moreover, we have also asked for their permission before we publish their opinion to the public and iGEM.
When designing the questionnaire, none of the questions is related to the privacy of respondents. And all the views from respondents we showed in our project and Wiki has gained permission by the individual.
We have strictly followed iGEM's Do Not Release safety policy. Our project is still at an experimental stage and no organism (genetically modified or otherwise) has been released or deployed outside a laboratory environment.