LCSS Overview

Laboratory Chemical Safety Summaries are reprinted with permission from Prudent Practices in the Laboratory: Handling and Disposal of Chemicals.Copyright 1995 by the National Academy of Sciences. Courtesy of the National Academy Press, Washington, D.C.

The Howard Hughes Medical Institute is pleased to collaborate with the National Academy of Sciences in making the 88 Laboratory Chemical Safety Summaries (LCSSs) prepared by the National Research Council, Committee on Prudent Practices for Handling, Storage, and Disposal of Chemicals in Laboratories, available on the World Wide Web.

The LCSSs are included as Appendix B in Prudent Practices in the Laboratory: Handling and Disposal of Chemicals, National Academy of Sciences, 1995. The LCSSs have been prepared in accord with the general and comprehensive approach to experiment planning and risk assessment that is outlined in Prudent Practices in the Laboratory, Chapters 2 ("Prudent Planning of Experiments") and 3 ("Evaluating Hazards and Assessing Risks in the Laboratory"), and should be used only by individuals familiar with the content of those chapters.

The LCSSs provide concise critical discussions of the toxicity, flammability, reactivity, and explosibility of 88 chemicals commonly used in scientific research laboratories. Directions for handling, storage, and disposal and special instructions for first aid and emergency response are given. Since many of these 88 chemicals are representative of a class of potentially hazardous compounds, the LCSSs can also be used as guides to handling many other compounds with related chemical structures. Unlike most Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDSs), the LCSSs are designed especially for laboratory workers.

The Committee on Prudent Practices for Handling, Storage, and Disposal of Chemicals in Laboratories encourages the rapid and widespread dissemination of the LCSSs. It anticipates that these Summaries will serve as models for the preparation of additional LCSSs for chemicals not included among the 88 provided here and in Prudent Practices in the Laboratory, Appendix B. In fact, the committee recommends that laboratory workers routinely prepare new LCSSs for unfamiliar substances as part of the risk assessment they should carry out for each experiment as outlined at the conclusion of Prudent Practices in the Laboratory,Chapter 3.