There is a shortage of freezers and space for new freezers in the faculty's premises.
Roger Lindskog is an expert at Med-service and is familiar with the problems of freezer storage in Lund. He says that a large part of the material that is currently stored in our -80 freezers and should probably therefore instead be classified as biobank material.
"Therefore, it is important to find out who is responsible for the samples; Lund University or Region Skåne, if it has been thinned and if it should be saved."
More space for freezers
Roger Lindskog is part of the so-called "Frysgruppen" which is led by Eva Ekvall Hansson, chairman of the Med-service board, and consists of researchers and service staff from BMC in Lund and CRC in Malmö. They have been tasked with freeing up space for freezer storage, both in terms of getting new material into existing freezers and that this is handled in a fair and structured way, as well as making room for more freezers in our premises.
Who is responsible for what
"Med-service is responsible for the basic range of certain equipment such as operation and alarms. On the other hand, it is up to the research groups to keep track of their material and the regulations that govern the handling. Another task for the research groups is to allocate space in the shared freezers on the floors of the lab buildings in a fair way," says Roger Lindskog.
In order to facilitate cooperation between groups that share freezers, work is now also underway to specify which equipment is basic equipment and what is optional. In addition, a new procurement of framework agreements for freezers is going on.
New Biobank Act
On 1 July 2023, a new Biobank Act came into force. How it affects the faculty's activities is currently being investigated by the faculty's biosafety committee. This will be discussed at the meeting on 9 April.
What's the worst thing that can happen if something goes wrong because you don't know about the new rules?
"This is a good issue to raise at the meeting and one that is also being investigated by the Biosafety Committee," says Roger Lindskog.