The point of exhaust sterility is not to keep the people around the reactor safe (of course there are execptions to every rule), it is to keep what is in the reactor in a controlled, sterile environment. That means taking sterility measures on the backside "exhaust" end also, even with positive pressure and sterile filtration devices on the intake, if your backside exhaust is not at least half as sterile as the intake, the frontside sterility measures are fruitless, IMO.
If you think that there is not too much air contamination where your reactor is think again, unless you are operating in a classified clean room
. Even still reactors that operate in class 100 clean rooms are fitted with sterile filters on the front and back sides.
Of course I am sure the sensitivities of reactions can be highly variable depending on what you are doing. I am not familiar with ergot, but I am a control freak so I would probably treat it with the highest degree of sterility possible, Of course I have been known to be too sterile at times.
I just think it would be advantagous to be able to control exactly what goes into your reactor, and remember that you could have the highest degree of sterility on your frontside and the whole reactor could become contaminated because of what got in from the exhaust.
As far as waterlocks go, they work good for making beer but I am not sure how well they work for other applications. I am sure there is someone here that has much more experience than I that could answer that question, hell it may have already been answered before
just feel like ranting,
m_e
