Expectations on Lab Members

We want to maintain a collaborative environment, where people contribute, share and respect each other's knowledge and expertise to generate exciting results.

General Lab Rules

Be polite to each other (style of emails, style of conversations, no usage of bad language in the lab).

Since all lab members are likely to be under stress, when a conflict arises, please consider (1) the other person is also likely to be stressed, (2) the other person may have a different style from yours in expressing or not expressing his/her reaction, (3) every action has a reaction (Newton) so even if there is no direct consequence, there is still damage being done.

(1) If person A is angry at person B, they should first try and work it out amongst each other, before coming to me unless person A or B for whatever reason cannot or does not want to work it out directly with the other person and needs my help in finding a strategy on how to handle the issue.

(2) If persons A and B cannot work it out with each other and there is no reason to ask my advise first, then the two people should come together to me and not separately.

Wepage updating and organization Nobody should modify flan or judithks webpages except people listed below, unless special permission has been obtained from Judith.
1. Seminar Scheduling and File Posting	Oznur, Judith
For details, see http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~judithks/lab/jksSeminar.html
2. Webpage updating	Naveena, Judith
3. Flan webpage updating	Madhavi, Yanjun, Naveena
4. Shechuling of spectrophotometer, fluorimeter and circular dichroism instruments.	Arpana
Instrumentation & Equipment We make an effort in having everything that affects more than one person assigned someone responsible. If we are missing something in the list below, pls. contact Judith. All questions or concerns or suggestions regarding the responsibility should be directed first at the responsible person, and this person has absolute authority in enforcing the rules for the respective items. If there is a problem, the authority and the user should come and talk to Judith together.
Laminate floor hood certification every 6 months	Harpreet
Microscope	Harpreet
Incubators (maintenance, repair, replacing CO2-cylinders , water, filter replacement every 2 years)	Harpreet
Pipettes	Harpreet
Water baths	Harpreet
Pipette aids	Harpreet
PCR machine	Naveena
Balances	Fernanda
Centrifuges	Fernanda
Gel apparatuses	Fernanda
Water purification system	Kalyan
Fridges and Freezers	Harpreet
Spectrophotometer	Naveena
Cuvettes	Harpreet
Nitrogen and argon cylinder supply	Naveena
Biorad purification system/HPLC	Eric/Naveena
Computers (update of virus definition files, windows update, communication with Phil Greer)	Naveena
Peripheral equipment (re-ordering of paper, toner) MilliQ Sanitisation	Harpreet Harpreet
Printer	Naveena
Servers at CMU (maintenance, restarting, user access)	Madhavi
Servers in Struct Bio at Pitt (user access, communication with Phil)	Naveena
Ready to present seminar preparation	Madhavi
Includes copying the presentation(s) onto the laptop, connecting laptop to LCD projector, connecting conference phone and having presentation(s) ready by half an hour before seminar

Materials
It is the responsibility of each lab member to inform the person responsible for a certain item when a reordering is necessary or if any problems have been detected. We make an effort in having everything that affects more than one person assigned someone responsible. If we are missing something in the list below, pls. contact Judith. All questions or concerns or suggestions regarding the responsibility should be directed first at the responsible person, and this person has absolute authority in enforcing the rules for the respective items. If there is a problem, the authority and the user should come and talk to Judith together.
1. Commercial Stocks of Special Chemicals.
1D4 antibody	Naveena
Detergents	Naveena
isotopes	Harpreet
Sepharose and other column materials	Eric
Serum	Harpreet
Media	Harpreet
Geneticin, heparin, pluronic acid, tetracycline and other tissue culture supplies	Harpreet
2. Antibodies
list to be provided by Harpreet and her name should be listed under responsibility. Harpreet needs to make a stock and provide people with aliquots.
3. Cell lines
list to be provided by Fernanda and her name should be listed under responsibility.
4. Plasmids & E.coli Stocks harboring specific Plsmids	Kalyan
Kalyan to make list and to maintain three boxes In the list: gene/mutation, name of plasmid, sequence of plasmid, information on cloning sites, who made it, where the original came from (e.g. pCMV, Phil Reeves, MIT), sequencing results (is this possible?)
5. Primers	Fernanda
list to include the name, the sequence and what plasmid/gene it is for.
6. Competent Cells & Expression cells main Stock	Fernanda
(not supply - every day supply is the responsibility of each lab member for their own consumption) like BL21 etc.
7. Enzymes related to Nucleic Acids	Kalyan
restriction enzymes and all other enzymes
8. Enzymes related to Proteins	Fernanda
proteases, PNGase F, other?
9. Ligands	Kalyan
11-cis retinal, all-trans retinal, mGluR ligands when we get them.
10. All general chemicals and solvents	Kalyan
Chemicals list at Room temparature Chemicals list at 4C Responsibility for reordering lies generally with all lab members. If an item is low, reorder. If you reorder something, ask around if other people noticed other items to be low. If you are busy or if you are not familiar with the ordering, note on paper on the wall next to the chemicals what needs to be ordered, together with your name, date and urgency of the request. Kalyan will order once a week. If you need Kalyan to order something urgently, make sure he knows. Orders over $150 require Judith's approval. Hussein maintains the chemicals list.
11. Liquid nitrogen
Department keeps a liquid nitrogen dewar in the 2^nd floor glasswash/autoclave room for general use.  Please do not use the dewars in the NMR lab or the x-ray crystallography lab.  Please notify me or Amy Farrell (amf61@pitt.edu) when the dewar is empty.	Kalyan
12. Chemicals sign-out sheets
Sign-out sheets are placed near the chemicals for detergents, serum, 1D4-antibody. You must sign out the amounts you take.
13. General lab supplies
Responsibility for reordering lies generally with all lab members. If an item is low, reorder. If you reorder something, ask around if other people noticed other items to be low. If you are busy or if you are not familiar with the ordering, note on paper on the wall next to the chemicals what needs to be ordered, together with your name, date and urgency of the request. Kalyan will order once a week. If you need Kalyan to order something urgently, make sure he knows. Orders over $150 require Judith's approval.
14. Snacks and coffee
Judith will refill snack box, coffee and creamer. Anybody is welcome to add to it.	Judith

Purchases

Master copy and excel spread sheet of all purchases made in the lab is maintained by Hussein. It is the responsibility of each lab member to provide Hussein with a copy of the order. When ordering something from common vendors, VWR, Sigma etc. pls. check around if other people want to order something as well since we can save on the shipping costs if orders to go out concertedly. All orders over $150 require Judith's approval. Otherwise, see rules above.

Arpana

Waste Disposal
Ethidium Bromide	Kalyan
Sharps	Kalyan
Chemicals Waste	Kalyan
Broken Glass	Kalyan

Monthly Duties and Responsibilities

As of the 1st of every month, the following duties change:

-         Removal of liquid biohazard waste from tissue culture hood as needed, but at least once/week

-         Removal/packaging/labeling of solid biohazard waste from tissue culture hood as needed

Schedule 2006 & 2007

October 2006	Fernanda Balem
Nov 2006	Hussein Baradia
Dec 2006	Harpreet Kaur Dhiman
Jan 2007	David Man
Feb 2007	Kalyan Tirupala
March 2007	Naveena Yanamala
April 2007	Fernanda Balem
May 2007	Hussein Baradia
June 2007	Harpreet Kaur Dhiman
July 2007	Arpana Dutta
August 2007	Kalyan Tirupala
Sept 2007	Naveena Yanamala
Oct 2007	Fernanda Balem
Nov 2007	Hussein Baradia
Dec 2007

Radioactivity Officer: Arpana Dutta

Lab Manager & Safety Officer: Harpreet Kaur Dhiman

It is the responsibility of the Lab Safety Officer to see to it that no unsafe practices (open food, unlabeled solvents, open bottles etc) are practiced in the laboratory.

Please email Judith (judithks@cs.cmu.edu) for further clarifications in the above information. 

---

Judith | Internal Website | JKS Seminars | Lab Duties & Resp | Lab Protocols | Scripts | Mailing List | Journal Club

Web page maintained by Naveena (naveena@cs.cmu.edu) and Judith (judithks@cs.cmu.edu)
Last modified: October 19, 2006