Top: A researcher works in a specialized Class II cabinet in a BSL-3 lab in Hyderabad, India. Visual: Taniya Sarkar for Undark R aghunand Tirumalai l

Mixed Lessons from Infecting People with Covid-19

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2025-01-02 23:30:05

Top: A researcher works in a specialized Class II cabinet in a BSL-3 lab in Hyderabad, India. Visual: Taniya Sarkar for Undark

R aghunand Tirumalai loves to talk about how well-run his laboratory is. “We’re very proud of the setup we have here,” he said on a Friday afternoon this October, standing in his office on the campus of the Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) in Hyderabad, India. The office was decorated with colorful artwork, including posters about tuberculosis and tiny plastic figurines of deadly bacteria and viruses.

Tirumalai joined CCMB in 2008 to study what makes the tuberculosis bacterium so virulent — knowledge that can help design better treatments for a disease that kills tens of thousands of people in India every year. This requires his team to work with live tuberculosis bacteria, a high-stakes dance that takes place under rigorous safety protections.

To enter the lab, Tirumalai first scans his fingerprint at the door. Next, he passes through two change rooms. In the first, he puts on shoe covers, a hair net, and latex gloves. He also dons a puncture-resistant Tyvek suit, an N95 mask, and safety goggles. In the second room, he snaps a second pair of latex gloves onto the cuffs of his suit so that no skin is exposed.