Task-specific vented safety enclosures are safety containment devices that provide enclosed work areas where the handling of potentially hazardous substances can be performed with minimal risk to users and also provide product protection.
These enclosures are used extensively in numerous pharmaceutical, chemical, biological, clinical, and toxicological laboratory facilities in industry, government, and academia. Vented workstations are custom tailored to meet the demands of many applications such as weighing, chemical transfer, pipetting, microscopy, histopath-ology, and even mailrooms. Most recently vented enclosures have found widespread use in the pharmaceutical industry for use with robotic and high-throughput technology and for the weighing of bulk powders in the pharmaceutical industry.
Many laboratory operations and processes can only be safely performed using large, traditional laboratory hoods. Many tasks previously done on the open bench have been moved into hoods because of increased safety awareness and regulations. But laboratory hoods have many limitations, (e.g. containment is not always effective; large space is required; they are not task-specific; hood relocation is difficult; purchase, installation, and operation is expensive; and they are increasingly complex).
Similarly, the quantity, chemicals, and methods used in laboratories are constantly changing. Smaller amounts and less hazardous chemicals are used when possible. High-tech methods like combinatorial chemistry decreased dependence on traditional laboratory experimentation. Finally, corporate restructuring frequently relocates and reorganizes laboratory work so that large hoods don’t always meet the needs of today’s dynamic laboratories.
In contrast to traditional laboratory hoods, vented enclosures are custom designed for specific tasks so that much less air is required. These smaller, precision-engineered enclosures are tested and validated so that less air at lower face velocities is used to provide laminar flow that produces minimal turbulence.
From “Task-Specific Vented Enclosures for Personal and Product Protection”
