> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://wiki.aclid.bio/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# IBC
> Register research projects with your Institutional Biosafety Committee, version each registration, record the committee's decisions and renewal dates, and keep the committee roster, meeting attendance, minutes and documents in one place.
IBC is where your organization keeps the work of its Institutional Biosafety Committee. Each **project** is a registration of research involving biological agents, with a principal investigator, an overview, the protocols it relies on and the registration document itself. A project is **versioned**: admins prepare changes in a draft, publish it, and the committee's decision is recorded as the project's status. Alongside the projects, the module keeps the committee's **members** and their roles, and its **meetings**, with attendance, notes and documents.
## Who can do what
| Action | Admin | Member |
| - | - | - |
| See **IBC** in the navigation | Yes | Only when they are the principal investigator of at least one project |
| View projects | Every project, including drafts and earlier versions | Published versions of their own projects |
| Create a project, start, edit and publish a draft | Yes | No |
| Update a project's status | Yes | Their own projects |
| Set or edit the renewal date | Yes | No |
| View committee members and meetings | Yes | Yes |
| Add committee members; schedule, edit and delete meetings | Yes | No |
| Take attendance, add guests, notes and documents | Yes | No |
## Open IBC
In the left navigation, under **EHS**, choose **IBC** (the path is `/ibc-projects`). The page is headed **Institutional Biosafety Committee** and has three tabs: **Projects**, **Members** and **Meetings**. For admins the button in the top right follows the tab: **Create IBC project**, **Add member** or **Schedule meeting**. Before anything exists, the tabs show **No IBC projects** (with an **Add a project** shortcut), **No IBC members** and **No meetings scheduled**.
## Key concepts
* **Project**: one registration under committee review. It carries a title, a **Principal investigator** (a user of your organization), an **Overview**, linked **Protocols** and one registration document per version.
* **Version**: projects are numbered **Version 1**, **Version 2** and so on. At most one version is a **Draft**, which only admins can see and edit; every other version is published and can no longer be changed. When a project has several versions a picker on its page lets you switch between them; the latest published one is marked **(current)** and the draft **(draft)**. Opening a draft shows **You're viewing a working draft (Version N) of this project**; opening an older version shows **You're viewing a previous version of this project (Version N). Previous versions can't be edited.**
* **Status**: the committee's decision on the project. **Not submitted** (yellow badge), **Submitted** (grey), **Approved** (green), **Approved with conditions** (green), **Deferred (modifications required)** (yellow) and **Disapproved** (red). Publishing a draft sets the status back to **Not submitted**, since the committee has not yet seen that version.
* **Review**: a committee review of a published project, with a review date and an **Outcome** chosen from the statuses above. Recording a review sets the project's status to the outcome and moves its renewal date to one year after the review date.
* **Renewal date**: when the project is next due in front of the committee. It appears in the **Next review due** column and in the project's **Renewals** card.
* **Committee role**: the seat a member holds. The roles are **Chair**, **Biosafety Officer**, **Biological Safety Officer (BSO)**, **Principal Investigator (PI)**, **Animal Expert**, **Plant Expert**, **Occupational Health Representative**, **Community Representative** and **Ad Hoc Member**. A role may carry a **Term start** and **Term end**.
* **Meeting**: a sitting of the committee with a title, date, time and optional location. Each meeting records who was **Present** or **Absent**, any **Guests**, free-text **Notes** such as agenda items or minutes, and uploaded **Documents**.
## Tasks
### Create an IBC project
Admins only.
1. On the **Projects** tab, click **Create IBC project**.
2. Enter the **Project title**, choose the **Principal investigator** and pick the **Project status**. All three are required.
3. Optionally drop the registration document on **Upload or drop a file** (PDF, DOC, DOCX or PAGES). When a document is attached, the project's **Overview** is written from it automatically; you can edit the text on the draft.
4. Click **Create**. The banner **IBC project created** appears and the project is listed as **V1** with a **Draft** badge until you publish it.
### Draft, edit and publish a version
Admins only.
1. Open a project from the list. On its latest published version, click **New draft** to copy it into a new draft version; if a draft already exists the button reads **Edit v2 draft** (with the draft's number) instead and takes you to it.
2. On the draft, use **Edit** on the **Overview** card to change the **Project title** and **Project overview**, **Edit** on the **Principal investigator** card to pick another investigator, and **Manage** on the **Protocols** card to search published protocols and add or remove them under **Linked protocols**.
3. In the version card on the right, click **Upload** (or **Replace**) to attach the registration document for this version. PDFs are previewed on the page; click **View** to open the file.
4. Click **Publish**. The banner **Version N of this project has been published** appears, the version becomes the current one and its status resets to **Not submitted**.
### Update a project's status
1. Open the project and click **Update status**. Admins see the button on every project; a member sees it on projects where they are the principal investigator.
2. Choose the new **Project status** and click **Update status**. The banner **IBC project status updated** confirms the change and the badge at the top of the page updates.
### Track renewals
1. Scroll to the **Renewals** card on the project's current version. **Last renewed** is the date of the most recent review and **Next renewal** is the renewal date.
2. Admins click **Set date** (or **Edit date**), pick the **Renewal due date** and click **Save**. The banner **Renewal date set** appears and the date shows in the **Next review due** column of the list.
3. The table below lists every review on file with its **Due date**, **Date completed**, **Outcome** and **Reviewer**.
### Add committee members
Admins only.
1. On the **Members** tab, click **Add member**.
2. In **Add IBC member**, choose the **Member** (only users not yet on the committee are offered), the **Role**, and optionally the **Term start** and **Term end**.
3. Click **Add member**. A banner confirms who was added and in which role, and a card for the member appears, showing the role and the term as a range of years, for example Term 2025–2026, or Term 2025–present when no end date is set. Clicking a card opens the member's user profile.
### Schedule a meeting
Admins only.
1. On the **Meetings** tab, click **Schedule meeting**.
2. Enter the **Title**, **Date** and **Time**, and optionally the **Location (optional)**. Click **Schedule meeting**; the banner **Meeting scheduled** appears.
3. Every current committee member is added to the meeting's attendance list. To change the details later, open the card's menu, choose **Edit** and click **Save changes**; choose **Delete** and confirm with **Yes, delete** to remove a meeting and everything recorded on it.
### Take attendance and keep minutes
Admins only.
1. Open a meeting from the **Meetings** tab. In the **Attendance** card, click **Present** or **Absent** next to each member, or **Mark all present** to mark every committee member at once (the banner **All members marked present** confirms it).
2. Click **Add guest**, pick a user under **Select a user...** and click **Add** to record someone who attended without holding a committee role. Guests are listed under **Guests**, marked present as soon as they are added and can be switched to **Absent** like any member; they are left out of the present count shown under **Attendance**.
3. Under **Notes**, type the agenda, minutes or vote tallies and click **Save note**. Each note can be removed with its trash icon after confirming **Yes, delete** in the **Delete note** dialog.
4. Under **Documents**, drop a file (PDF, DOC, DOCX or PAGES), give it a **File name** and click **Upload**; the banner **Document uploaded** appears. Documents open in a new tab and can be removed after confirming **Delete document**.
## Reading the list
* **Version**: the project's current version, **V1**, **V2** and so on. A **Draft** badge means the newest version has not been published; members do not see these rows.
* **Title** and **Investigator**: the project name and its principal investigator. Clicking the row or choosing **Details** from the row menu opens the project.
* **Status**: the committee's decision, coloured as listed under Key concepts.
* **Next review due**: the renewal date. The badge is red once the date has passed, amber when it falls within the next 30 days and grey otherwise; a dash means no date is set.
* **Members** cards show each member's name, role and term.
* **Meetings** cards show the date, time and location. Future meetings carry a yellow **Scheduled** tag; past meetings show how many committee members were present, for example 2 of 3 present; guests are not counted.
## Tips and limits
* A member who is not the principal investigator of any project does not see **IBC** in the navigation at all.
* A project can have only one draft at a time, and **New draft** is offered only on the latest published version. Overview, investigator, protocols and the document can be edited on a draft only.
* **Manage protocols** lists published protocols only; publish a protocol under Procedures before linking it.
* Project and meeting documents accept PDF, DOC, DOCX and PAGES files up to 25 MB.
* **Set date** and **Edit date** are available on the latest published version only, never on a draft or an earlier version.
* Recording a review is not available in the app yet; the **Record** button in the **Renewals** table does not appear. Recording a review sets the project's status and its next renewal date at the same time, and the review is then listed in the table.
* Uploading or replacing a project's document rewrites its **Overview** from the new file, replacing any text entered by hand.
* Each person holds one committee role. **Add member** does not offer people who already have one, and a role cannot be changed or removed from the app.
* Members added to the committee after a meeting was scheduled are not added to that meeting; record them with **Add guest** if they attended.
* Deleting a meeting removes its attendance, notes and documents and cannot be undone.
## Related
* [Users](/guides/users) for the user profiles that member cards open
* [Roles and sites](/api/roles-and-sites) for the admin and member roles
* [File uploads](/api/uploads) for sending project and meeting documents through the API
* [GraphQL reference: IbcProject](/api/reference/types/IbcProject)
* [GraphQL reference: IbcMeeting](/api/reference/types/IbcMeeting)
* [GraphQL reference: IbcMemberRole](/api/reference/types/IbcMemberRole)
* [GraphQL reference: createIbcProjectReview](/api/reference/mutations/createIbcProjectReview)
* [GraphQL reference: deleteIbcMemberRole](/api/reference/mutations/deleteIbcMemberRole)
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