Aseptic technique

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Aseptic technique

Introduction

The principle of aseptic technique is to prevent the introduction of unwanted micro-organisms into your culture or environment. When micro-organism are in the air, they can enter the culture when the lid is removed. The micro organism ill be culturing is yeast which is a fungi. Pure yeast cultures are grown in a medium of sugars, nitrogen sources, minerals, and water. The final product may take the form of dried yeast cells. Fungi are a group of cells or multi cellular cells which feed direct from absorption of nutrients.

Aim:

During the course of this project I aim to successfully grow a yeast culture and sterilise the equipment that I use. I also hope to gain the skill of aseptic technique and hope to use it in high level science.

Safety

There are many safety issues that arise when dealing with chemicals and laboratory’s that is why when conducting an experiment all safety aspects need to be thought about before carrying out the experiment otherwise someone could occur contamination or a serious injury when conducting the experiment. One of the main parts of the human body when carrying out chemical experiments are they eyes do to the fact they can easily be damaged and are clearly one of the most  delicate exposed parts of the human body. To protect these fragile biological sensors a form of protection is crucial. The most common form of eye protection in the laboratory are the goggles.

The goggles appear to be very unattractive to many people but and are often interoperated as a burden and not a safety precaution. The goggles are made out of thick plastic which prevents any liquids entering the eye and causing any harm. Many people who wear contact lenses are under the illusion that there contact lenses will perform as eye protection not realising that the contact lenses are creating a risk of chemicals to become trapped between the lenses and they eye and create extensive eye damage. The goggles can also protect the eye from objects being hurled across the laboratory by immature minds or by the smashing of glass which would send pieces flying in all directions. In the case that somebody’s eye/eyes came in to contact with chemicals follow through the procedures of emergency eye was immediately:

  • Water/eye solutions should not be directly aimed onto the eyeball, but rather, aimed at the base of the nose. This increases the chance of effectively rinsing the eyes free of chemicals (harsh streams of water may drive particles further into the eyes).
  • Eyelids may have to be forcibly opened to attempt eye rinse.
  • Flood eyes and eyelids with water/eye solution for a minimum of 15 minutes.
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Clothing is also another aspect of laboratory safety it may not seem like it but It plays a vital part in protecting the skin from the harm of chemicals that is why it is advisory to cover as much of the body as possible while dealing with chemicals due to the fact that chemical can be corrosive and cause damage to the skin. The clothing can help by absorbing as much o the chemical as possible leaving hopefully a minor amount of the chemical to react with the skin. Another way of avoiding contact of chemicals with skin is to ...

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