More than 20 years of cell cultures and other specimens stored at New York’s Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute were destroyed when a cleaner switched off power to a lab freezer, according to a lawsuit filed by the school.
The institute is seeking US$1 million ($1.6m) from Daigle Cleaning Systems, claiming one of the company’s employees turned off the circuit breaker for the freezer, which must keep specimens at -80C, according to the lawsuit filed this month.
The freezer was used by researchers studying how plants use photosynthesis to create energy. A notice had been placed on the unit’s door reading in part, “This freezer is beeping as it is under repair. Please do not move or unplug it,” shortly before the cleaner came into the lab on September 17, 2020.
The cleaner heard the “annoying” alarm that evening and tried to turn the circuit breakers on. But the cleaner actually moved the breakers from the “on” to “off” position. The temperature inside the freezer rose to -32C, the lawsuit said.
Graduate researchers discovered the freezer was off the next day and tried the mitigate the damage, but “a majority of specimens were compromised, destroyed and rendered unsalvageable”, demolishing more than 20 years of research, according to the complaint.