This policy applies to all individuals entering or working in UCLA research or teaching laboratories, including faculty, staff, students, volunteers, and visitors.
Safety is a shared responsibility:
- Principal Investigators and lab supervisors ensure training, hazard assessments, and appropriate PPE use
- Departments support communication and enforcement
- Faculty, staff, students, volunteers, and visitors must follow PPE and safety requirements
- EH&S provides guidance, inspections, enforcement, and authority to stop unsafe activities
Principal Investigators and lab supervisors are responsible for ensure training, hazard assessments, and appropriate PPE use.
When hazardous materials are present, the following PPE is required:
- Full-length pants (or equivalent garment of adequate thickness/protective barrier)
- Closed-toe shoes at all times, the area of skin between the shoe and ankle will not be exposed.
- Appropriate protective gloves when handling hazardous materials
- Laboratory coats, or equivalent for benchtop or adjacent hazardous work
- Flame-resistant lab coats for pyrophoric materials or certain flammable liquid work
- ANSI-approved eye protection when handling hazardous materials
- Gloves and lab coats must not be worn in public areas except under limited, approved conditions. Any travel that requires moving to another building or transferring floors is not considered adjacent and requires lab coat removal.
- Lab coats must be professionally laundered at no cost to the employee, home laundering is not permitted
- PPE must be selected and used in a way that does not create new safety risks
Laboratories that do not use hazardous materials may request designation as a non-hazardous materials use area from EH&S. PPE requirements may differ once approved and labeled.
