Our typical lab operation practices can be modified to reduce the risk of transmitting virus. The risk can be reduced by limiting the number of people in the lab, cleaning surfaces, wearing PPE, and (in case of multiple people) maintaining distance. Different levels of operation can be defined with varying risk levels.

Some general considerations:

1. Much of the activity required for lab operations can and has already often been done by a single operator.
2. In general working solo in the lab, assuming there are any hazards at all, is itself a violation of safety protocols - if an operator is injured and incapacitated, there should be someone else around to help. Therefore for solo operation, remote monitoring is recommended (more on this below).
3. Some lab procedures are physically difficult for one person to do and are usually done as 2-person jobs. We have already put some thought into modifying these tasks to make them more doable for one person. We should think about improving this. (Major concerns here include protecting equipment, such as the LHe transfer line and the detector tower.)
4. It would be useful if one person could work remotely with the onsite operator through conferencing. Many lab activities are easier with two people, e.g having one person make measurements while another logs them. It's also often nice to have two sets of eyes looking at live data and making decisions.
5. When we transition to more than one person in the lab, we should come up with ways to do typical work at greater distance. One example is to work at well-separated computers, perhaps monitoring the same data from two places (e.g. two instances of the pulse viewer).

There are two possible ways to do one-person operation: either have just one team member who goes into the lab, or allow multiple members to take shifts. In either case only one person is in the lab at a time. If multiple team members take shifts, care should be taken to keep touched surfaces clean. Wearing gloves while at keyboards, turning valves, moving equipment and so on is one way to do this. Frequent hand-washing could be considered an alternative to constant use of gloves. Cleaning surfaces also helps to mitigate transmission risk. Wearing a mask greatly reduces the chance of spreading viruses to surfaces.

A concern about this mode of operation is that it is against general safety protocols to work alone given the potential hazards in the lab. Constant remote contact with another team member would mitigate the problem of working alone . The operator would set up a Skype or Zoom call, ideally with video, and the remote team member would monitor the operator. It could be that the two are working “closely” together, with the operator explaining what he/she is doing and the remote person soliciting advice or asking questions. On another level, it could simply be that the remote member is monitoring the lab activities in the background, on a separate device from their main work. Alternatively there could simply be lab webcams that could be monitored, with no audio. The basic task of the remote team member is to be aware of the possibility of any emergency that may require help.

If possible, we should keep track of who else is working in the building. It's reasonable to assume that by the time hibernation ends, there will be staff working regularly (Mike Rother, Amy Nastrom Nordlander, etc.) The external monitor should have the numbers of staff to call in case of emergency. They should also know who to call if staff can't be reached (for most emergencies this is simply 911).

Multi-person lab operations involve increased risk in terms of virus transmission. At the same time they eliminate the safety concerns of solo lab operations, so that the monitoring protocols of solo work can be dropped.

There are several ways to minimize the virus transmission risk. First, teams should be limited to two people at a time. The pool of shifters should also be kept small (ideally to 2, maximum 4), minimizing the number of people exposed to one another. Masks and gloves should be worn. When possible, distance should be maintained. In practice it will be difficult at times to maintain distance. There are a few common lab activities that can be modified to increase distance.

The daily task of liquid helium filling, in the usual two-person mode, requires the team members to be within a few feet of each other. On the other hand one person can do the fill (as will be the case in Tier 1 and 2 operations), though it is more difficult.

Assembly of equipment in the lab cleanroom is often more conveniently done with two people. Distance can be increased by not working at the same table. Most of the physical tasks can be done easily enough by one person. A common way to work as a team is for one person to assemble equipment/make measurements, while the other records progress/results on the wiki. This can be done with a separation distance of several feet.

In normal circumstances, the closest working conditions occur during installation of equipment in the cryostat in the mini cleanroom (also called the clean tent). Sometimes just one person works in this confined space, but often it is advantageous for two people to work together: for training purposes, to make the work somewhat faster, and for a few operations (like raising the tower into the cryostat) to make the work much easier. In restricted Tier 3 multi-person operation, we would avoid if at all possible two-person work in the clean tent. Installation work would be limited to trained personnel (although a more experienced member could supervise from outside). If possible we could devise a one-person technique for tower installation that would be easy enough to minimize the risk of damaging equipment.

During a run, standard operations involve monitoring the cryostat and operating the DAQ to take data. In the current lab configuration the computers for these tasks are close to one another. With a multi-person team it is very common that team members will stand close to one another, viewing pulses or watching the cryostat readout, working together to troubleshoot problems and make decisions. Sometimes as in the clean room one person will make measurements while the other records the results in a spreadsheet or on the wiki. In restricted multi-person operations, working closely should be avoided. When two people are looking at the same display, one should increase his/her distance, avoiding the inclination to step close as they might in ordinary circumstances. The person close to the display should be ready to step aside to let the other see more closely. Note that although there is one DAQ computer, any other work station in the lab can simultaneously run the pulse viewer – it should become a habit to view the DAQ from multiple computers. When one person is making measurements and the other is recording data, they should be at well-separated work stations. Team members should make an effort to speak loudly and project thaeir voices, to make it easier to work together while keeping separation.

Advice concerning restarting research operations during the Covid-19 pandemic

CONTEXT: I am a researcher managing a small lab that tests particle detectors operated at cryogenic temperatures. The lab team consists of me, a few graduate students, and a couple of undergraduates. During an experimental run, which may last weeks, many operations can be performed remotely, but some require a person in the lab. Before the pandemic, a typical in-lab crew was 1-3 team members.

SINGLE-PERSON OPERATIONS:

• In terms of minimizing the spread of viruses, the safest way to restart the lab is to have only one person in the lab. If it is the same person every day, no special precautions are necessary apart from mask use, distancing, and hygiene practices when using shared areas in the building. If team members alternate as the in-lab operator, more precautions are called for to minimize the spread of virus from touched surfaces (keyboards, often-used equipment, etc.). The best way to mitigate this is to have a protocol of frequent hand-washing: when entering and leaving the lab, and frequently during the day, and to avoid touching one’s face. Safer still would be to wear gloves while in the lab, and safest would be to also wear a mask, to block sneezes and coughs. These practices could be combined in some way with cleaning surfaces (door handles, valves etc.)
• Working alone in the lab, in the presence of various hazards, is itself a problem in terms of lab safety. The reason for this is that no one is there to help in case of incapacitating injury. To mitigate this problem, single-person operation should only be done with remote monitoring. This can be done with lab webcams, and a designated off-site team member tasked with making sure the operator is ok. Additionally the operator should check in and out of the lab in some way (for example by text messages) to the off-site monitor.
• Assuming that some research operations can be performed remotely, the in-lab operator should minimize the time in the lab, planning ahead for what in-person tasks are necessary.
• Assuming that there are some physical tasks that are difficult for one person to perform, effort should be put into making these tasks easier for a single person. Equipment can be purchased or built for this purpose. For example, if a task requires moving heavy or bulky equipment, platforms or jigs can be employed, to serve the same function that a second person would otherwise perform.
• Considering the advantages of having multiple team members in the lab – e.g. to gain lab experience, to work together on troubleshooting, to share data taking tasks – it is recommended that at appropriate times an off-site team member should work virtually with the in-lab operator, through a phone call or through teleconferencing software. Some effort can be put into making this more practical, e.g. utilizing hands-free Bluetooth headsets.

MULTI-PERSON OPERATIONS:

• At some point it will be useful to return to having more than one person in the lab, at least some of the time. This is especially true considering the need to train newer, less experienced team members.
• When more than one person is in the lab, masks should be worn, and distancing maintained. Team members should get used to speaking loudly, to counter the habit of standing close to one another during conversations.
• All physical tasks that are typically done by more than one person should be reviewed. If they can be done with sufficient distancing, there is no need to modify procedures. If they require working closely, they should be modified as possible to be doable by one person only.
• Assuming that some in-lab operations involve multiple team members viewing the same information on a computer at the same time, changes should be implemented so that the display can be mirrored on multiple computers, so that the team members can simultaneously view the same information while separated.
• For operations using lab computers, each team member should have their own workstation if possible. Additionally, if computer tasks can be performed on personal laptops, team members should use their own laptops. Sharing the same keyboard/mouse or the same laptop should be avoided.

When hibernation started we were in Run 72, the first run using the GeHV prototype detector with the metal etched away from one side. The detector is installed with the source mover. We took a fair amount of drifted-HV data. We tried near the end to move the source, but had communication issues with the controller board. We had cryo problems attributed to a leak at the top of the stripline tube that let helium into the IVC, and warmed up just as the hibernation started.

The most logical thing to do upon restarting (and what I had planned to do before the quarantine measures began) is to try to fix the leak (without lowering the cryostat), cool down again, and continue Run 72. We should take data at lower voltages, to get more information about the mysteriously low Luke gains. We should take more thorough IbIs data to further assess the gain. And we should resolve the source mover problems and try to acquire a good dataset of position data.

Below is a list of initial tasks. The assumption is that one person (Matt Fritts) will be present in the lab to perform them. Hazards are listed and remote safety monitoring of some kind is assumed. Times required for tasks are listed; it may be best in terms of the pandemic to limit the time in the lab on any given day, and work from home the rest of the day.

Lab reopening approval

emergency_contact_poster_pan43.pdf