Category: Quality & Safety
Topic: Centrifugation Safety
Article Title: Bio Safety

Hettich manufacturers a variety of buckets and lids designed for bio-containment. These lids and buckets have a special screw cap design with bio-safety seal that contains any accidental tube breakage and traps it within the bucket.

If users have to centrifuge hazardous materials or compounds contaminated with toxic, radioactive or pathogenic micro-organisms, they must take appropriate measures. For hazardous substances, centrifuge containers with special screw caps must be used. In addition to the screw cap centrifuge containers, for materials in hazard category 3 and 4, a bio-safety system must be used (see the World Health Organization’s “Laboratory Bio-safety Manual” ***Link***). In a bio-safety system, droplets and aerosols are prevented from escaping by a bio-seal (packing ring). If the bucket of a bio-safety system is used without the lid, the packing ring must be removed from the bucket in order to prevent the packing ring from being damaged during the centrifugation run. Damaged packing rings must not be used to seal the bio-safety system. Without the use of a bio-safety system, the centrifuge is not microbiologically sealed in accordance to the EN / IEC 610101-2-020 standard.

For further details of available bio-safety systems see “Rotors and accessories" ***Link***. If in doubt, you should obtain relevant information from the manufacturer.