NIH Research Festival 2012 Program - Research Festival - National ...

National Institutes of Health Environmental Management System (NEMS)
http://nems.nih.gov
The NEMS Sustainable Laboratory Practices Working Group and NEMS IC Green Teams
Council work jointly to “green” the laboratory and office environments at NIH. Many of the
diseases that we research at NIH have been shown to have an environmental component.
As a result, NIH has a unique responsibility to carefully consider the environmental impacts
of our day-to-day activities. NIH is a leader in environmental stewardship, but we can do
even better. Each of us can take simple actions to minimize our environmental impacts.
The NIH Environmental Management System (NEMS) is a management tool that helps
us identify our most pressing environmental issues, set goals to address those issues,
and improve our environmental performance. NEMS challenges NIH employees and
contractors to conduct their activities in a more environmentally sound manner. The IC
Green Teams, set up by each institute, are working toward greening each institute in
general, with special emphasis on office greening. The NEMS Sustainable Laboratory
Practices Working Group is developing procedures and tools on how to green laboratory
activities. The group has been focusing its efforts to promote the use of less-toxic
chemicals, reduce the use of laboratory supplies that can potentially lead to an increase
in the release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and endocrine system disrupting
chemicals into our water, and promote energy use reduction activities in the laboratory.
Each year the group holds Green Labs Fairs where researchers can share their success
stories of using greener technologies.
NIH Intramural Research Program
http://irp.nih.gov
The Intramural Research Program (IRP) is the internal research program of the National
Institutes of Health (NIH), known for its synergistic approach to biomedical science.
A new IRP website and social media channels were launched in September 2011,
bringing together information and online resources from 26 IRP programs within 23 NIH
Institutes and Centers. One year later, the website is expanding to include profiles for
the approximately 1,200 Principal Investigators in the IRP, each categorized by Scientific
Focus Area to assist visitors in finding the info they need. A new IRP Accomplishments
section is in the works, in addition to several new stories of IRP Research in Action.
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