Drosophila researchers around the world have taken steps to green their lab operations while maintaining good laboratory practices. These efforts include preventing material waste, energy conservation, and leveraging the attributes of this model organism to reduce the need for testing in mammalians. We hope you are inspired by the initiatives of these green labs!

Working parameters with drosophila

The Drosophila melanogaster model system is well known for its efficiency in life science. Its rapid generation, low-maintenance culture, ease of genetic manipulation, and availability of extensive fly stock lines provide a strong foundation for discoveries. At the same time, fly experimentation also requires specific culture conditions and safety protocols which present practical limitations for adjusting lab operations in pursuit of lab sustainability. Typically, fly labs freeze transgenic flies in disposable vials or bottles for twenty-four hours before autoclaving on site and discarding everything labeled as autoclaved for general waste. Frozen fly culture waste can also go directly into biohazard red bag waste for incineration by an outside service. Wildtype flies are not regulated waste so these can be discarded as trash. Fly food media is often aliquoted in single-use vials or bottles with disposable cotton plugs. Ethanol is used to clean materials, equipment, and work areas to protect against mite infestations that can destroy fly stocks. Laboratories often use drosophila incubators, rather than keeping large fly stock rooms at controlled temperature and humidity conditions. A caveat with incubators is that models with non-cycling refrigeration compressors use more energy and release more heat than more energy-efficient models. Optimized culture conditions, biosafety regulations, and lab equipment types are parameters that researchers must work within when improving sustainability.

HOw drosophila researchers have improved sustainability

Green lab groups are cognizant of the connection between plastic waste and environmental pollution. They have questioned the value of the convenience over reprocessing to sterility requirements for reuse. New materials have been adopted and challenges to develop new testing models for biomedical science have been accepted. Below are just a few notable efforts by lab groups.

1. Scientific Development

   Indiana University (IU) researchers are focusing on developing fruit flies for New Approach Methodologies (NAM) for chemical testing without mammals, and belong to a consortium called PrecisionTox, which aims to protect human health from the toxic effects of chemicals found in people's homes, food, and the environment.

2. Eco-friendly Shipping Containers

   The IU Bloomington Drosophila Stock Center offers recyclable shippers as an alternative to EPS foam for orders of any of the 84,000 fly stock lines they maintain.

3. Re-usable fly culture materials

   Several groups are processing autoclavable plastic drosophila bottles and vials for reuse to prevent plastic waste.

   • The Raff Lab at the Babraham Institute is a certified Gold LEAF laboratory that pioneered washing fly food vials for reuse as noted by Researcher and Post Doctoral Lab Manager, Saroj Saurya, Ph.D.

   • Also in the U.K., the fruit fly facility at Bournemouth University developed a protocol to recycle ~100 vials each month for use with healthy flies while adhering to waste regulations

   • The University of British Colombia Green Labs Program notes how fly cultures in reusable containers, are autoclaved, washed, and sterilized using a multi-nozzle cleaning system developed to efficiently clean large numbers of plastic drosophila (fruit fly) vials to eliminate hundreds of kilograms of unrecyclable plastic waste each year.

   • The Jakšić Lab of École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EFPL) in Switzerland has moved to reusable foam plugs in place of disposable cotton wool plugs.

Fly lab work is practically synonymous with the history of genetics research. Cheers to all the biologists in fly labs who are supporting a future of sustainable science!