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Biological safety cabinets designed to protect the operator and the environment from low- and moderate-risk biological agents. These cabinets typically consist of an enclosure with an open front for handling of products. They include blowers to produce an inward flow of room air into the hood front and an exhaust system with a high-efficiency particulate-air (HEPA) filter that exhausts the air through the top rear directly to the outside or, less frequently, into the laboratory. Class I microbiological safety cabinets can provide biological safety for operation of devices such as blenders; toxic and radiolabeled materials may be handled inside these cabinets if inlet air release gloves are added and the gases are exhausted to the outside environment. Since the incoming air is not filtered, these cabinets are not appropriate for handling materials that are susceptible to airborne contamination.
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