Safety autoclaves

Laboratory Safety Autoclaves/Sterilizers Quick Facts (OSHA 3405—2011). 

High Osmolality Contrast Media. An important advance in radiopaques came with the synthesis of aminotriiodoben2oic acid and its acetylated derivative, acetrizoic acid [85-36-9] (5) (8,9). Aqueous solutions of sodium acetrizoate possessed the thermal stabiUty so that they could be autoclaved (10) with minimal decomposition. The higher iodine content, ie, 3 atoms/molecule, increased the contrast efficiency, and the clinical safety of acetrizoate was improved over that of the earlier urographic agents. 

High pressure autoclaves may be used fitted with remote control behind safety barricades, which are necessary beeause of the danger of explosions. In a typical process the autoclave is half-filled with alcohol containing 15%... 

Respirator parts Moist heat (autoclave) Moist heat (low- temperature steam, or hot water at 80°C) Sterilization Disinfection Sterilization by steam where possible Chemicals not recommended may be microbiplogically ineffective, may present hazard to patient safety by compromising the safety devices on the machine... 

For high-pressure operation, safety considerations are extremely important and care must be taken to ensure proper mechanical design. Closures must be designed to withstand the same maximum pressure as the rest of the autoclave. Various authors have treated the problems involved in designing medium- and high-pressure batch reactors (2-4). 

The original hydrothermal method involves heating the reactants in a closed vessel, an autoclave, with water (Figure 3.5). An autoclave is usually constructed from thick stainless steel to withstand the high pressures, and is fitted with safety valves it may be lined with non-reactive materials such as teflon. The autoclave is heated, the pressure increases, and the water remains liquid above its normal boiling temperature of 373 K, so-called super-heated water . These conditions, in which the pressure is raised above atmospheric pressure and the temperature is raised above the boiling temperature of water (but not to as high a temperature as used in the... 

The autoclave should be capable of withstanding a pressure of 3000 p.s.i. This provides a margin of safety, since at 220° the pressure is about 2600 p.s.i. 

The F value used in the design of a sterile cycle may greatly exceed the minimum F0 of 12. An F0 = 18 min will provide a 50% safety factor that will take into account additional time that may be required for steam to penetrate certain containers in middle or cool locations of the autoclave. 

The autoclave was equipped with a separate pressure relief system consisting of a rupture disk and a safety valve connected to it in series (set pressure 50 bar in each case). It was clear from the debris that these mechanisms had been activated. 

Heat-stable solutions, rubber bungs and liners, bottles with plastic caps, ultrafiltration apparatus etc. are all sterilised by steam treatment at elevated pressure. Although the time required to sterilise is usually only about 15 min at 15 lb pressure the cycle time for modem autoclaves is several hours. This is because of the safety precautions built into these machines to prevent the doors being opened until the temperature of liquid within bottles has fallen to 80°C. 

Homoleptic [Tc2(CO)10)] can be synthesized in autoclaves, a procedure that is difficult to reproduce owing to safety regulations [39-41]. [Tc(CO)6]+ is avail-... 

Biohazard handling. All sample handling and disposal procedures should be performed in compliance with the guidelines of the institutional Environmental Health and Safety Office. Gloves should be worn when handling the samples. Discard tips, pipettes, and tubes into a radioactive waste bag, or an autoclavable biohazard bag. 

Flow reactors offer considerable advantages over sealed autoclaves for supercritical reactions. Not only do flow-reactors require a much lower volume than a batch reactor for a given throughput of material (with obvious safety advantages) but also it is much easier to optimise reaction conditions in a flow reactor. We have already reported [4,5] the use of a miniature flow-reactor for the photochemical preparation of unstable metal complexes. We are now extending these techniques to the study of thermal and catalytic reactions. As an initial stage we... 

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