Our center, under the guidance of its administration and as part of its ongoing scientific activities, held a workshop on “Bio-safety and Biological Laboratories” in February 2025. The workshop, organized by the workshops and seminars committee headed by Assistant Professor Dr. Hana Hani Al-Saffar, was managed by Assistant lecturer Ali Kamel Wanas and presented by lecturer Dr. Hind Diaa Hadi, Assistant lecturer Suhad Hamza Muhammad Ali, and Assistant lecturer Maab Riyad Sajit.
The workshop emphasized the importance of occupational safety and health, defined as the procedures and regulations designed to protect workers in factories and other facilities from potential accidents that could result in injury, death, or property damage. A key focus was on adhering to biosafety and chemical safety protocols within laboratories. The goal of biological safety is to safeguard workers from diseases caused by hazardous biological agents, maintain a safe working environment, control biological pollutants through risk assessment and management, and ultimately prevent the spread of these pollutants outside the workplace.
Key recommendations from the workshop included guidelines for waste disposal:
Water-soluble chemicals: Only those suitable for sewer disposal and treatment plants should be discarded this way.
Flammable solvent solutions: These must be significantly diluted with water before drain disposal to mitigate fire hazards.
Strong acids and bases: These must be diluted to a pH between 3 and 11 before drain disposal, ensuring a discharge rate of at least 50 cm³/min for the concentrated material.
Highly toxic materials: Disposal of these materials down the drain is strictly prohibited. This includes substances like mercury, nickel, arsenic, chromium, cadmium, zinc, phenol compounds, cyanide, and sulfur.
We wish all the faculty of our center continued success in serving the community, science, and knowledge.