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This year’s Lab Safety Awards have been presented, with the top prize going to a lab that handles potentially infectious biological specimens from around the world.

 The One Health Institute Laboratory, led by Brian Bird, an associate adjunct professor of emerging and zoonotic diseases, was this year’s grand prize winner, earning a $6,000 prize. The awards were presented on Oct. 20.

“Dr. Bird's lab demonstrates a great willingness to ensure safety and safe practices,” wrote the Lab Safety Professional who inspected the One Health Institute Lab. “An example is laboratory manager Dr. Tracy Drazenovich requesting a customized version of our Lab Safety 201 class that was initially offered to lab personnel who had completed our Lab Safety 101 class.”

Bird highlighted the importance of safety to the work of his lab.

“Safety is at the center of all the work we do, and in the coming years we hope to continue and expand our work on globally impactful diseases through the development of innovative detection approaches and countermeasure development,” he said.

Other winners of the awards, which are administered by Safety Services, are:

• — College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
• — College of Biological Sciences
• — College of Letters and Science
• — College of Engineering
• — School of Medicine 

Officials are now collecting data for the 2024 awards cycle. All labs that receive a comprehensive annual lab safety review and are headed by an academic senate member in the professor series are eligible to win.

Last year’s winner, Assistant Professor of Evolution and Ecology Rachael Bay’s Lab in the College of Biological Sciences, used the prize money to buy a kit to test department safety showers, plus a new computer for the lab manager.

Hayley Morris, communications specialist in Finance, Operations and Administration, contributed to this article.