Throughout the duration of our project we have had to adhere to many safety practices and protocols! Of course WHMIS and MSDS’s were a large part of that, however they are actually a part of the law here in Canada and Alberta! Every member of the iGem high school team had to participate in a WHMIS course (and pass!) to be able to work in the lab.
All members of the high school iGem team also had to participate in lab tutorials as well as lab safety training before we got to begin work on the project ourselves. The University of Lethbridge also has a wonderful check in system which we used in some places of the lab. When you go into the lab, you sign in and it allows the security to not go off and it helps to make sure everyone is safe. Within the lab there are goggles, lab coats, and gloves to protect any person.
There are also emergency showers and eyewash stations to further protect anyone from any dangerous chemical which might come in contact with the skin. Being only high school students, we also always had to make sure at least one university student was in the lab with us at all times, like a buddy system. This was to minimize mistakes within the lab. It also helped to use all equipment properly. There was no eating or drinking in the lab. We also had a specific dress code when participating in lab activities. Closed toed shoes, long pants, goggles, gloves, and lab coats had to be worn at all times when in the lab. Frequent hand washing also became a trend. We also labeled every vial we used as to what DNA strand was in it and which media we used and our initials, to prevent others from having to guess what was in the container. Another thing that we learned was to take off one glove if we had to move locations (from one lab to another, etc,) to ensure nothing on our gloves such as harmful or corrosive chemicals got on any door handles.
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