Bio Safety Cabinet Vs Laminar Air flow Cabinet

Whether you should go for bio safety cabinet or opt for laminar air flow??

The laminar air flow and bio safety cabinet, both are protection equipment used in laboratories for performing different kinds of work. These two appear to be same and have many differences. Each equipment has different levels of safety. Based on our needs, we should decide which one is suitable for us. We can choose between these depends on what we are intended to safeguard, whether the user, product, environment or all the three.

Laminar Air Flow Cabinet	Bio Safety Cabinet
Protects only the product in the chamber	Protects the user, product, and the environment from hazardous materials
Only suitable to work with noninfectious agents and culture samples	Suitable to work with infectious agents
2 types - Vertical and Horizontal Laminar air flow cabinet (based on the direction of air flow)	3 types - Class 1, Class 2, and Class 3 Biosafety cabinet (based on the level of protection)
Vertical laminar air flow cabinet – Air moves from the top to the work bench Horizontal laminar air flow cabinet – Air moves from behind towards the user	Class 1 BSC - only operator and environment safety Class 2 BSC – user, product, and environment safety. Based on the exhaust, air velocity and pressure, it is further classified into A1, A2, B1, B2 and C1 Class 3 BSC (Glove box) - complete user, product, and environment safety
Air from the environment (room where the cabinet is placed) pulled by the blower and enter the work bench through HEPA filter.           Air from the work bench move towards the user then back to the environment.           Unidirectional air flow with fixed velocity and pressure.           Some cabinets have UV light for sterilization.	These BSCs are provided with HEPA filters to decontaminate the air moving out.           Most BSC also used to sterilize the materials kept inside.

    

Hope this information helps! ☺