Dear Birck Research Community, As we are opening our facility in these times of COVID 19, we are implementing several protocols that support safe distancing, sanitization of surfaces, and other practices designed to protect our users and prevent the spread of the virus. As such, each lab within Birck has an associated Standard Operating Procedure (SOP). If you have questions about approved SOPs, open labs or access, please contact Ron Reger. A key part of COVID 19 safe practices deals with safe distancing which dictates that only a certain number of people can occupy the lab space at any given time. This is significantly different than in the past where anyone who was approved to work in a lab could simply swipe-in with their key card at any time. Starting immediately everybody must make a reservation to work in any lab at Birck, and once the maximum number of people is reached then additional users cannot enter until someone vacates the lab. You can schedule your time in the lab through the Purdue PASS system (Purdue Appointment Scheduling System). Here is the link to PASS: https://engineering.purdue.edu/PASS Another useful resource is on the Birck Wiki where the list of labs is shown with their maximum occupancy and there are links to each lab in the PASS system: https://wiki.itap.purdue.edu/display/BNCWiki/COVID+De-densification+Lab+Sche... Additionally this information is contained on all equipment pages: https://wiki.itap.purdue.edu/display/BNCWiki/Facility+Notices The link entitled “COVID De-Densification Lab Scheduling” will take you to the lab list with links to PASS. Each lab has 1-hour scheduling increments and you may reserve consecutive 1-hour blocks if needed. Please be considerate of your fellow researchers and only schedule the time you will need, as others will need to wait their turn and therefore some work will be delayed. Also, if you are unable to use your scheduled time, please remove your reservation in PASS. These are unprecedented times and we do our best to follow best safe practices. Please stay vigilant and ask Stephen Jurss or Ron Reger if you have any questions. It is better to double check if something is not clear. There is no perfect protection and if there are any incidents or local spread of virus, that will impact everybody in the facility. Jaime will send an email about the student, staff and faculty forums next week where we can discuss more about Birck operations. Please let me or others in the leadership know if you have any questions or comments. Best regards, Ali