Safety of microbiological study

Course annotation

Safety of microbiological study (3 European Credits)

Taught by: Prof. Maria Karpova

Against the background of exponential development of biology, microbiology, virology, molecular medicine the biological safety and risks management issues become more and more important. The biological safety in practice is presented to students as follows:

1. Biosafety science links theory and practice of human beings protection against the hazardous biotic factors.

2. Biosafety as an engineering discipline deals with medical, biological, administrative and technical measures to protect staff, population, and environment against biological pathogens.

3. National biosafety as a system of administrative and technical measures is focused on prevention of damage and devoted to achievement a personal, public and state protection against potential and real biological hazards.

The human factor is still the most important one for ensuring biosafety, so the quality of biosafety education should be significantly improved.

The appropriate microbiological technologies together with correct usage of biosafety equipment by the well-trained staff are the main components of biosafety inside the laboratory.

The course provides students with the knowledge and practical skills in biosafety. 

The module covers the following topics:

• Potential biological hazards.
• The basis of biosafety and biodefense.
• Practical issues of biosafety and biodefense.

Learning objectives

As the result of the module, a student must:

• know: the theoretical basis of biosafety, regulations and guidelines.
• be able to: apply the appropriate methods to provide biosafety in laboratories and industry.
• master: the methods of biosafety for solving the issues related to biosafety and biodefense.

Content of the module

The module consists of three sections.

Section 1. Potential biological hazards.

The topics of the module include basic concepts of biological hazards, classification of biological objects according to the safety levels. Infections, both viral and bacterial,  with high individual and community risk, the natural focal infections, the nosocomial infections, biosafety ensuring while working with causative agents. The main biological risks and preventive measures are also discussed.

Section 2. The basics of biosafety and biodefense.

A domestic and international systems of biosafety along with the appropriate documents, regulations and guidelines issued by the Russian Federation, the World Health Organisation, the USA and the European Union will be discussed.

The basic bioethics principles and requirements for conducting experiments with animals and volunteers, the actual international and domestic rules are reviewed. The criteria for estimation of biological risks are introduced. The pipeline of ensuring biosafety based on the calculated biological risk is discussed.

Section 3. Practical issues of biosafety and biodefense.

This section deals with practical issues of biosafety and biodefense.  The principles of ensuring biosafety while working at research laboratories. Laboratory equipment for biosafety. The principles of ensuring biosafety while working with animals. The principles of ensuring industrial biosafety in biotechnology and microbiology.  The pathogens and infected material transportation issues. The emergency plan.

Overview of tasks and lectures

The module is scheduled for the second semester. The length of the module is 6 weeks (8 two-hour lectures, 6 two-hour seminars and 2 four-hour laboratory works). Students are given 72 hours for individual studying of material.

Topics of lectures:

1.   Potential biohazards.

2.   High risk, quarantine and natural focal infections.

3.   Blood-borne infections.

4.   Ebola virus as a modern biological hazard.

5.   Bioterrorism.

6.   Ethical and legal issues in biomedical studies.

7.   Biosafety of biotechnological and microbiological productions.

8.   Biosafety and recombinant DNA technology.

Topics of seminars:

1.   Biosafety ensuring while working with causative agents.

2.   Nosocomical infections and biosafety ensuring while working with causative agents.

3.   Biohazards while working with blood.

4.   Effect of different factors on microorganisms. Sterilisation methods.

5.   Disinfection and individual and public safety ensuring. Importance of disinfection in ensuring biosafety.

6.   The principles of ensuring industrial biosafety in laboratories of different biosafety level. The pathogens and infected material transportation issues. The emergency plan.

Topics of laboratory works:

1. Sanitary-bacteriological evaluation of the environment: air, water, soil.

2. Sanitary-bacteriological evaluation of hand skin. Studying the effects of different antiseptics on hand skin.

Position within the programme

This module deals with the principles of biosafety and forms basic skills of upcoming researchers. The knowledge and skills are vital for scientific research in biomedicine.

Teaching format

Structure

The module is scheduled for the second semester. The total complexity of the course is 3 credits /108 hours, including 36 hours in the classroom. The length of the module is 6 weeks (8 two-hour lectures, 6 two-hour seminars and 2 four-hour laboratory works). Lectures and seminars are conducted in multimedia classroom, equipped with technical means for video conferencing, as well as presentation and interactive equipment. Laboratory works are organized in a microbiology laboratory.

Grading

The form of final assessment is a credit test (pass/fail examination). The credit test is taken in the form of a written test on the theoretical material and students are required to correctly answer at least 80% of the questions.

Main literature

1.   Nanoplasmonic Quantitative Detection of Intact Viruses from Unprocessed Whole Blood. ACS Nano, 2013, 7 (6), pp 4733–4745. http://pubs.acs.org/doi/ipdf/10.1021/nn3036232.

2.   Liu C., Xie X., Zhao W. Static Electricity Powered Copper Oxide Nanowire Microbicidal Electroporation for Water Disinfection. Nano Lett., 2014, 14 (10), pp 5603–5608 http://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/nl5020958.

3.   Favero M. S. Disinfection and Sterilization in Healthcare Facilities New Biocides Development, Chapter 2, 2007, pp 31-50 http://pubs.acs.org/doi/pdf/10.1021/bk-2007-0967.ch002.

4.   Hansen, Doan J. The Work Environment. Volume 2, Healthcare, Laboratories and Biosafety () J. Chem. Educ., 1994, 71 (2).

5.   AT LAST: A BIOSAFETY PACT. Most parties are reasonably satisfied with the treaty on biotech organisms, but the effect on trade in transgenic commodities is unclear BETTE HILEMAN. Chem. Eng. News Archive, 2000, 78 (7), pp 65–73.

Additional literature

6.   Liu C., Xie X., Zhao W. Conducting Nanosponge Electroporation for Affordable and High-Efficiency Disinfection of Bacteria and Viruses in Water. Nano Lett., 2013, 13 (9), pp 4288–4293 http://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/nl402053z