Campus nano: Protecting the health of workers in and near academic research laboratories

Residing at the forefront of novel technologies and materials, workers in academic laboratories are a group that is particularly vulnerable to repeated exposures with often unquantified risks. Yet, the occupational health and safety of this group of workers have received scant regulatory attention. By way of illustrating the complexities of and tensions between innovation and novelty on one hand and occupational health and safety on the other, we offer a case study conducted at a large US research university that examined the Institution's efforts at oversight of nanotechnology research. Most significantly, our work has unearthed the necessity to modify epidemiological methods – the mainstay of occupational health surveillance – to accommodate short-lived, yet potentially highly intense exposures to nanoparticles in the course of research in the university lab setting. Our findings highlight also the need for clarification of the role of the Principal Investigator (PI) as Occupational Health Enforcer; recognition of ways occupational health hazards differ in academic research than in industry; and reliable and consistent methods of identifying who is doing what research (i.e., an inventory) in the University research setting. In our discussion, we elaborate further on recommendations for strengthening the regulatory oversight of occupational health and safety in the academic research environment.