Nanotechnology and the Pharmaceutical Industry - an interview with Don Ewert of OSO Biopharmaceuticals. Hello everybody and welcome back to another episode of the BioPharma EH&S Podcast, my name is Dean Calhoun of Affygility Solutions and this is the podcast dedicated to discussing critical environmental, health and safety issues facing the biopharma industry, helping you take your environmental, health and safety programs to the next level. Overview I’ll briefly cover what we talked about last time in episode number 17  Then I will cover our main topic for today, which is an interview with Don Ewert, Environmental, Health and Safety Manager for OSO Biopharmaceuticals.  In this interview Don and I will discuss nanotechnology and some of the key environmental, health and safety issues surrounding this emerging technology And finally, we’ll discuss upcoming events and happenings of importance to environmental, health and safety professionals in the BioPharma Industry. So, without further delay, let’s go ahead get started.  Last time in Episode number 17 we discussed the topic of “Containment Validation and Surrogate Monitoring.”  In that Podcast, Matt Meiners, Laboratory Services Manager for Bureau Veritas and I discussed what is surrogate monitoring, some of the key factors to consider when selecting a surrogate compound, and finally, what are some of the common mistakes that occur when performing containment validation and surrogate monitoring.  It was a great interview, and I appreciate Matt taking the time out of his busy schedule to participate. If that’s something that may interest you, I would suggest that you go back and listen to Episode 17.   Alright, let’s now move on to our main topic for today which is an interview with Don Ewert, Environmental, Health and Safety Manager on nanotechnology.  I should mention ahead of time, that this section of the podcast was recorded on January 19th, 2012 via Skype.  There is a few instances where we have a Skype garble moment, so I do apologize in advance for that. So without further delay, here we go. [audio portion]  O.k., that does it for our main topic, let’s now talk about some upcoming events.  The first set of events that I would like to mention is in early February.  In February, Affygility Solutions has several webinars starting and I would suggest that look at our schedule at Affygility.com.  These webinars have been extremely popular and we have received a lot of positive feedback on them.  In February, we have a new webinar on Manufacturing Highly Potent Compounds – Understanding and Controlling the Risks.  This is a brand new webinar and we are very excited to be premiering it.  It you are an certified industrial hygienist and involved in potent compound safety, certification points are available.  Additional webinars for the month of February include our every popular isoflurane safety webinar.  Again, if any of that interests you, I would suggest that you go to Affygility.com and look at our full schedule. The next event that I would like to mention is the annual Society of Toxicology conference to be held on March 11th through 15th in San Francisco.  Affygility Solutions won’t be exhibiting at this conference, but our Senior Toxicologist, Joe Nieusma, may be attending.  If you would like more information on this conference go to the Society of Toxicology’s website at sot.org  Then at the end of March, the Society of Chemical Hazard Communication will be having it’s Spring Meeting in Nashville, TN.  We haven’t decided if we will attend this meeting or not, but in any case, these are usually very informative event and with GHS due to be finalize in early 2012 I’m sure there will be great sessions. You should go to their website for more information.  The URL for their website will be in the show notes.