Prepare for your visit
Bringing Materials
Before starting work at CHESS, it must be determined whether Hazardous Materials are involved. If such materials are to be brought, specific information must be provided and internal procedures followed before beamtime is granted. When submitting your proposal, all materials that will be brought or sent to CHESS must be declared. The CHESS User Safety Committee will review each proposal and determine if any hazardous materials are included. The following information is required for EACH MATERIAL:
- Name of material (one form for each material)
- MSDS Sheet (MSDS CHESS inventory)
- Description of substance (powder, liquid, solution, etc.)
- Quantity (mass, concentration)
- Means of containment (sealed in glass capillaries, flasks, encapsulated, etc.)
- Toxicity routes (ingestion, subcutaneous, absorption, inhalation)
- Procedures in case of emergency (clean-up, evacuation, emergency first-aid)
Include safety precautions your home institution requires or suggests in the proper handling of the material and what actions should be taken in the event of an emergency.
All proposals that are declared hazardous will be assigned a Safety Coordinator (a member of the CHESS User Safety Committee) to check-in the group or materials when they arrive at CHESS and check-out the group or materials at the conclusion of the beam time. The Safety Coordinator will ensure that all equipment is safe to use, will go over detailed safety information related to the experiment, and will arrange for the disposal of any hazardous waste. Contact the CHESS User Safety Committee at chess-safety@cornell.edu with any questions regarding hazardous materials and safety concerns.
Users are encouraged to bring the smallest amounts possible of hazardous materials to CHESS.
Please do not bring the hazardous materials into the building before you meet with a member of our User Safety Committee. The operator on duty will put you in contact with this person during check-in. In certain instances, a preliminary inspection will be required before the material is allowed into the building.
Brief guide: Hazardous vs. Non-hazardous
An experiment is non-hazardous if:
- The protein or other material being studied is not toxic or infectious to humans.
- No heavy atom compounds are used (intrinsic metals such as the iron in hemoglobin are not considered as heavy atoms, nor are metal foil reference samples).
- Heavy atom compounds are present only in pre-derivatized crystals.
- Crystals are mounted in capillaries, frozen, or contained in solutions free of the heavy atom compound or other chemical hazards.
An experiment may be hazardous if:
- Heavy atom compounds or other chemical hazards are present outside of crystals. You must supply CHESS with a list of all materials or buffer components, including the type and amount of each compound. The User Safety Committee will then review the list and classify the experiment as hazardous or not.
An experiment is hazardous if:
- The protein or other material is toxic or infectious to humans.
- The experiment materials include buffers, solvents, solutions, etc. containing chemical hazards present at levels above an acceptable limit as determined by the CHESS User Safety Committee.
If in doubt, contact station scientists for clarification.
