Lab Safety

In 2008, when I was a first year grad student, a lab tech at UCLA burned to death due to improper lab safety practices. She had not been trained to work with the chemical she was handling. She had not been trained in proper PPE. She was not being properly supervised, and, finally, nobody who responded knew what to do in an emergency. It was a tragedy that didn't need to happen.

Sheri and I were the same age. We had graduated from sister schools (Harvey Mudd for me, Pomona for her) in the same consortium on the same day. My wife, another Pomona grad, had probably gotten her diploma only a few minutes before Sheri did. We had both come to UCLA, joined labs, and started our experiments, and now she was dead.

Lab Safety Is Important.

Lab safety is not only the checking off of trainings when you join the lab or when you do your annual refreshers, but part of a culture that keeps us all safe.

Safety Questions: The number one rule is this: If you have any questions about your work, especially where your safety is involved, bring them up right away! Talk with me, your labmates, and EH&S to identify the safest way to proceed. Help your labmates to adopt the best practices that you learn.

Lab Attire -- make sure you have appropriate attire

• Shoes: closed-toe, closed-heel, non-absorbent material

• Clothing: No exposed skin from ankles to neck to wrists when doing experiments. The top half of your body will be protected by a lab coat, meaning your need to pay closer attention to the bottom half. No shorts or ripped jeans are allowed when doing experiments. I would much rather you lose an item of clothing to a spill than get permanently injured.

• Avoid drapey clothes and hairstyles. Neither of them have any nerve endings, so you can't be sure that they're not wandering close to a bunsen burner, a vial of phenol, or something else.

Lab Protocols: When writing or editing lab protocols, add notes about safety. This encompasses everything from biosafety (avoiding spreading pathogens like adenoviruses used for transfections) to chemical safety (do you need a fume hood? How should this be disposed of? Do you need a special kind of glove?),to Sharps, Pressurized Gasses or any other object of concern. If you have questions, ask!

Headphones. I always enjoy listening to podcasts or music while doing experiments, and you should feel free to listen to whatever you want to on your headphones. To maintain situational awareness, its best to listen with only one ear covered so you don't cause an accident by bumping into a labmate that you couldn't hear walking behind you.

Supplemental Safety Videos:

Susanna Harris, a former UNC graduate student and current science-communication Wunderkind, is releasing videos about lab safety here. She's also, incidentally, a good person to follow on twitter for important discussions about taking care of yourself and your mental health during a research career.