Happy New Year to the Science Community!

Thank you for being interested in sustainable laboratory work! 

We plan to bring you more great, green lab information in 2018!  Please contact us at info@labconscious.com, if you would like us to share an environmentally friendly lab work idea with the Labconscious community.  

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Cheers!

Labconscious hopes that laboratories everywhere achieve their greatest research goals, using efficient laboratory work that protects our earth's resources and supports human health!

Image copyright: Radisa Zivkovic 

Featured
Estimating the Carbon Cost of E. coli Transformations
Estimating the Carbon Cost of E. coli Transformations

Over the past year, Célia Algros took part in a project to discover microbial enzymes that could metabolize nucleosides in an internship at NEB. In an offshoot of this project, she also surveyed energy consumption, consumables, and waste generated to estimate the carbon cost of her E. coli transformations. The effort gave her a new appreciation for both the complexity of calculating carbon footprints and the sizable environmental impact of experiments.

A Garden to Inspire Sustainability at King’s College London
A Garden to Inspire Sustainability at King’s College London

Biologists often collaborate with non-scientists to improve environmental footprints. Events and spaces that remind us of our place in nature are a great way to connect everyone in a school or workplace to sustainability goals. Megan Williams, was a Research and Core Team Technician in the School of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Medicine & Sciences at Kings College London, when she saw an empty outdoor space on her urban campus and envisioned a community garden for fellow biologists, students, staff, and campus workers.

How can you be sure your lab plastic is actually recycled?
How can you be sure your lab plastic is actually recycled?

You might be skeptical looking at plastic recycling in the lab and you probably should be. The expectation is that carefully sorted non-contaminated recycling collections will be remanufactured into products that will lower the demand for fossil fuel-based plastic. Unfortunately, according to the report, The Real Truth About the U.S. Plastics Recycling Rate, the conversion of plastic recycling collections into new materials, known as source reduction, has failed. Mixed plastic collections are especially at risk.

No Cost Low Cost Lab Sustainability Strategies
No Cost Low Cost Lab Sustainability Strategies

Good science can go further with lab changes that drive down costs. The problem is that biologists asked to cut overhead costs in biotech or pharma lab work may not know where to begin. A nice overview of universal approaches to improving lab sustainability was shared with Labconscious by Steve Miller from Lab ReNew.

Team Empowers Early Stage Climate Biotechnology
Team Empowers Early Stage Climate Biotechnology

Solutions for changing climates are in demand for agriculture, carbon dioxide removal, methane abatement, health impacts, and many more areas. There is funding available. What’s holding biotech back? Talented scientists often don’t know where to find funding and how to communicate their projects to investors in a compelling way.

Drosophila Delivers Sustainable Science
Drosophila Delivers Sustainable Science

Drosophila is strongly associated with scientific discovery, but this model organism also represents practical advantages for sustainability from research to industry. When you look at the field you can’t help being impressed by the resources conserved by the approach.

My Green Lab launches Impact Laboratories to enhance its advocacy and help meet new eco-label and research grant requirements
My Green Lab launches Impact Laboratories to enhance its advocacy and help meet new eco-label and research grant requirements

Biologists should be aware of two trends related to this update from My Green Lab. First, lab sustainability accreditations have emerged as requirements in research grant funding policies, and second, government regulators have raised the bar across the board for green claims and certifications to overcome a loss in public trust.

The First PLA Plastic Plates Offered for Tissue Culture
The First PLA Plastic Plates Offered for Tissue Culture

It’s always exciting when a maverick hits the mark. The first polylactic acid (PLA) Petri dish product is a one-to-one replacement for labs using fossil fuel-based plastic plates for cell culture. The maker, a small privately owned company called Diversified Biotech, Inc., collaborated with researchers from Brandeis University to develop it. Fostering eco-justice with a simple swap sounds good, but could this specialized PLA material even improve cell culture?

Why do most new biosafety cabinets still have UV lights?
Why do most new biosafety cabinets still have UV lights?

If ultraviolet light decontamination is not supported for class II biosafety cabinets in BSL-2 labs, and UV bulbs consume so much energy, why are most new BSC cabinets still ordered with UV lamps? Spoiler alert: some burgeoning bioscience applications require it, and fortunately, there are some options to improve its sustainability.

A New Approach to Sustainability - A Conversation on the Re-Advance Initiative
A New Approach to Sustainability - A Conversation on the Re-Advance Initiative

Often, the validation work involved in establishing new protocols holds us back from improving the sustainability of lab work. Patrick Penndorf, a cofounder of the Re-Advance initiative, explains their efforts to overcome barriers to sustainable science and gives scientists a chance to join their Innovator Team.