The Dunn School’s sustainability journey is shaped by the everyday practices of its laboratories. Among them, the Raff Lab, led by Professor Jordan Raff and Lab Manager Dr. Saroj Saurya, has been a driving force for change — piloting reuse protocols, reducing single-use plastics, and inspiring initiatives that are now embedded across the whole department.

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Reuse and Waste Reduction

• Reuse: By washing and reusing consumables, the Raff Lab now saves around 70,000 single-use items every year, including fly vials, bottles, embryo collection plates, centrifuge tubes (15/50 ml), colony picker trays, plastic spreaders, and DNA prep columns. This equates to an 85% reuse rate for lab plastics.

• Recycling: Contaminated tips, tubes, bacterial plates (without agar), serological pipettes, reagent bottles, gloves, plastic packaging, and other hard-to-recycle items are decontaminated (chemically or by autoclave) and recycled, giving a 14% recycling rate.

• Incineration: Only 1% of plastics (e.g. tubes with pellets, heavily contaminated gloves) are incinerated.

Together, these measures have reduced annual plastic-related emissions from 2,020 kg CO₂ in 2019 to 383 kg CO₂ in 2025 — an 81% reduction — while also generating annual cost savings of £14,548.

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Scaling Up Impact

What began in the Raff Lab has now scaled across the entire Dunn School. In the past year alone, the department diverted:

• 500+ kg of lab plastics (tips, tubes, flasks, pipettes, plates) through RecycleLab for mechanical recycling into new consumables

• 400 kg of gloves and packaging through Appleton Woods, where plastics are repurposed into durable products such as furniture ply

 

Sharing Knowledge Beyond Oxford

The Raff Lab’s work is not only transforming Dunn School practice but also shaping the wider sustainability community through:

• Publishing protocols and case studies, including Challiner M, Saurya S, Patel S, Raff JW, Fostier M, Prokop A. Genetics. 2025. In collaboration with the University of Manchester for reusing fly vials and bottles

• Presentations by Saroj and Jordan at international events, including the EMBO Centrosome Conference (Istanbul), ASCB (USA), IBDM (Marseille), BSCB (Liverpool), EMBL-EMBO, MRC workshops, and the forthcoming European Drosophila Conference (Alicante)

• Supporting other Oxford departments and UK universities to adopt reuse workflows and refill stations

 

Celebrating Department-Wide Achievements

The Raff Lab’s pioneering efforts directly contributed to the Dunn School’s landmark sustainability successes in 2025:

• LEAF Gold certification achieved through a single departmental submission, with the formal award on 17 September 2025

• Beyond Gold Green Impact Award celebrated in July 2025

• Saroj Saurya shortlisted for the Green Gown Awards (Sustainability Champion – Staff), with the winner to be announced in November 2025

• Finalist recognition for Saroj Saurya and the Dunn School Green Group in the Oxford Climate Awards 2025, with results to be announced on 17 September 2025

 

A Model for Sustainable Science

The Raff Lab — led by Jordan, Saroj, and its members over the past five years — demonstrates how targeted, practical solutions in a single research group can catalyse cultural change across an entire department and beyond. By combining technical innovation with community engagement, the lab has delivered measurable environmental and financial savings, influenced national sustainability standards, and positioned the Dunn School as a leader in sustainable research.