Specialized Resources and Facilities
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Blood Research Institute, BloodCenter of Wisconsin (BRI/BCW)
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Blood Research Institute Core Laboratories
Location: BRI, 8733 Watertown Plank Road
Cost Structure: Fee-for-service
User Base: Collaborating investigators
BloodCenter of Wisconsin Web site
The Blood Research Institute offers several Core Laboratories that are available to MCW staff and faculty upon request. Each lab is staffed by at least one research technologist and each has a Scientific Director who is a BRI Investigator with experience in the given Core technology and is available for consultation. The Molecular Biology Core offers DNA sequencing using an ABI 3100 capillary DNA sequencer, real-time PCR with either a Bio-Rad I Cycler iQ or an ABI 7500 and bead array analysis using a Bio-Rad BioPlex system. The Protein Chemistry Core synthesizes peptides using an ABI 433. This core also offers peptide purification and quantification as well as a variety of post synthesis peptide modifications. The Hybridoma Core produces murine and hamster monoclonal antibodies. The Flow Cytometry Core provides flow cytometric analysis and cell sorting. This core has two Becton Dickinson LSR II multicolor cytometers, one BD FACScan cytometer and a BD FACSAria high-speed cell sorter. The Imaging Core features a variety of microscopes with fluorescence capabilities including an inverted Nikon TE200, a Zeiss Axioscope and a Zeiss Lumar V12 stereomicroscope. The Biophysics Core is equipped with a BIAcore 3000 Plasmon Resonance Spectrometer and a SLM-AMINCO 8000 Fluorescence Spectrophotometer. The Viral Vector Core is shared between the BRI and MCW and specializes in vectors based on lentiviruses and adenoviruses.
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Cancer Center
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Lymphocyte Propagation and Cell Processing Laboratories
Location: Froedtert East Pavilion, Room 322
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: Limited to collaborating investigators
The Lymphocyte Propagation Laboratory (LPL) provides essential core facilities and services for clinical and translational research protocols in blood and marrow transplantation (BMT) and adoptive cellular immunotherapy. The Cell Processing Laboratory (CPL) supports the clinical activities of the pediatric and adult BMT Programs and is responsible for the processing of marrow and peripheral blood progenitor cells or other blood cells processed for direct infusion. The CPL laboratory is accredited by the Foundation for the Accreditation of Cell Therapy (FACT) for allogeneic and autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, by the College of American Pathologists (CAP), and by the Joint Commission of Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JAHCO).
The LPL and CPL are located on the 3rd floor of the Froedtert East Pavilion. There are dedicated rooms and specialized equipment for handling infectious and potentially pathogenic agents. Clinical scale cell separation devices (including a CliniMACSÒ device and an Isolex 300i device) are available for large scale selection of blood progenitors. The laboratories are fully equipped with biosafety hoods, incubators, waterbaths centrifuges, refrigerators, cell harvester, radiation counters, two COBE 2991 cell processors, inverted and regular light microscopes, a tube sealer and a tubing connector (to create sterile fluid paths), and balances. An ELISA reader, ELISA washer, cytocentrifuge, dissecting microscopes, and fluorescent microscopes are available. There is a separate room for molecular biology work, including a PCR machine, hybridization oven, shaker platforms, rotators, various gel boxes, power supplies, separation columns and fraction collectors. Liquid nitrogen (LN2) storage freezers are located in core space along with –80oC and –20oC mechanical freezers. A computerized database is used to maintain the location and identity of samples within the various LN2 freezers.
Research protocols supported by the LPL and CPL are performed either under an IND (FDA's Investigative New Drug), an IDE (FDA's Investigative Device Exemption), and/or an IRB (Institutional Review Board) approved protocol. The facilities of the LPL and CPL are available on a limited basis for collaborative clinical and translational studies.
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Cardiovascular Center (CVC)
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Cardiovascular Center Core Facilities (David Harder, PhD, Director)
Location: MEB-4th Floor
Cost Structure: Not specified
User Base: CVC investigators and others with permission
CVC Website
The Cardiovascular Center (CVC) offers a variety of core equipment that is available to all MCW faculty and staff upon request. The CVC Imaging Core offers an Olympus fluorescence inverted microscope and a Nikon fluorescence microscope that are used for digitizing light and fluorescent signals on histology slides. Included in this core is a Vivid 7 Ultrasound that is used for echocardiograms on research animals (See "Echo Core Lab" listing), and a Typhoon Imager for digitizing Phosphor, Fluorescence, and Chemiluminescence signals.
Other CVC core equipment includes a BioRad BioPlex system that is used for quantitation of cytokine and a iCycler real-time PCR for the quantitation of mRNA. The CVC core also has a Microbeta Liquid Scintillation counter for the detection of radioactivity, a Beckman DU640 Spectrophotometer for measuring absorbance in UV and visible wavelengths, and an AutoLumat LB953 Luminometer for measuring luminescence.
Other facilities available within the CVC include an Analytical Core with two HPLC units, a Tissue Culture Core and a Free Radical Research Core. Additional CVC core equipment includes Sorvall Ultracentrifuges (3), Sorvall Superspeed Centrifuges (3), a Virtis freeze dryer, a BioRad Gel Dryer with savant speedvac, and a Microm Cryostat for sectioning frozen or fixed tissues.
For a complete list of CVC Core Equipment with descriptions and locations, or to schedule a time to use the equipment contact the coordinator, Aaron Schuett.
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Center for Biopreparedness and Infectious Diseases (CBID)
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Biosafety Laboratory - Level 3
Location: MFRC 6041
Cost Structure: Not available
User Base: Restricted to current users
MCW has a BSL-3 facility that is heavily used. Access is restricted to current users. Contact Dr. Frank to inquire about the BSL-3 facility.
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Children's Research Institute (CRI)
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Children's Research Institute (CRI) Pharmacogenomics Core Facility
Location: CRI-2nd Floor
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: Collaborating investigators
The Pharmacogenomics Core Facility was established within the Children's Research Institute to facilitate the development and broadening of research in pharmacogenetics at the Medical College of Wisconsin. Although resources are limited, expertise and instrumentation is available for conducting either candidate gene or pathway-intense approaches to understanding how genetic variability impacts drug response. Individuals interested in developing or extending such a research effort should consult with Dr. Hines.
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Children's Research Institute Zebrafish Core
Location: CRI-3rd Floor
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: Limited access
The CRI Zebrafish Core does not provide services, but the equipment is available for use by CRI investigators. The facility includes main and quarantine rooms dedicated to individual CRI zebrafish investigators. Two procedure rooms are equipped with two Nanoject injectors attached to Zeiss Stemi 2000 basic scopes, Zeiss V8 basic stereoscope, Zeiss M2 Discovery fluorescent scope (RFP, GFP) with attached color camera and an incubator with digital temperature readout to maintain zebrafish embryos. Contact Dr. Elena Semina to inquire about equipment use or if you are interested in using zebrafish in your research.
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Department of Pediatrics GI Aquaculture Facility
Location: MFRC-5th floor
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: Limited access
This aquaculture facility is a state-of-the-art recirculation facility that can accommodate up to 3000 tanks, and is specialized for genetic research using the zebrafish as the model system. The facility serves primarily as an animal resource to support the research of the Dr. Alan Mayer's laboratory in its study of intestinal development in zebrafish. The facility is staffed by a full-time technician who spends 50% of his time performing general facility work. Please contact Dr. Alan Mayer to discuss possible collaborations or options for use of the facility. There is a fee for use based on shelf occupancy and monthly inventory.
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Department of Biochemistry - Shared Research Instrumentation
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Department of Biochemistry -Shared Research Instrumentation
Location: TBRC or BSB
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: Collaborating investigators
Biochemistry Weblink
The Biochemistry Department maintains several instruments for macromolecular characterization. They include:
· Jasco J-710 Circular dichroism spectropolarimeter (contact person: Brian Volkman, PhD)
The Jasco J-710 circular dichroism (CD) spectropolarimeter is equipped with a thermally regulated sample compartment. Monitoring of the far-UV and/or near-UV CD spectra can provide valuable information about the secondary structure, thermal stability, or conformational state of a protein.
· Photon Technologies Inc. Quantamaster spectrofluorimeter (contact person: Brian Volkman, PhD)
The Quantamaster spectrofluorimeter is outfitted with dual excitation and emission monochromators for high sensitivity, a thermally regulated sample compartment, and Glan Thompson polarizers for fluorescence anisotropy measurements. The instrument is suitable for emission/excitation scanning experiments, fluorescence experiments requiring synchronous scanning of the excitation and emission monochromators, time based fluorescence measurements, fluorescence resonance energy transfer experiments and fluorescence anisotropy measurements.
· Microcal VP- Isothermal Titration Calorimetry (contact person: Evgueni Kovriguine, PhD)
The Microcal VP-ITC is capable of measuring heat evolution as little as 0.4 nanoJ/sec. This instrument is suitable for the studies of protein-ligand and protein-protein interactions and provides the biochemists with reliable measurements of binding constants in the range of 103-109 M-1 as well as the enthalpy and stoichiometry of interactions. ITC is a preferable technique to demonstrate the interaction between newly discovered binding partners in vitro.
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Department of Biophysics
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Department of Biophysics 9.4 T Animal MRI Scanner
Location: MFRC-2nd Floor
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: All investigators at MCW and outside institutions
Website
The Bruker Biospec system has an actively shielded 9.4 Tesla magnet with a 31 cm warm bore. This system has a magnetic field uniformity of 0.1 ppm over a 70 mm DSV, and 10 ppm over a 180 mm DSV. To keep such high levels of magnetic field uniformity, there are 12 user-adjustable shim coils. The infrastructure is in place to augment the vendor-supplied shims with 6 additional shims coils, which would be used to further enhance magnetic field uniformity for imaging and spectroscopic studies. Gradients of up to100 mT/m can be generated along all 3 axes. The RF system has 2 transmission channels, capable of experiments on 1H, 19F, 13C, 14N and 31P nuclei, and 2 matching receiver channels, capable of 16-bit resolution at a 2 MHz sampling rate. This collection of hardware will allow gathering of high quality imaging and spectroscopic data, since the shim system should be able to generate extremely uniform fields, and the gradients, in conjunction with the RF transmission and receiver sub-systems, allow collection of data at extremely high rates, necessary for functional magnetic resonance studies.
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Free Radical Research Center
Location: MEB 4830
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: Collaborating investigators
Website
The Free Radical Research Center was created in order to define and investigate the role of nitric oxide and oxy radicals in cardiovascular, neurodegenerative and inflammatory diseases. The goals of the Center are to promote translational research in free radical-mediated diseases, understand the mechanism of action of antioxidants in human disease, and develop therapeutic interventions in free radical based disease processes as well as the capability of non-invasive imaging of free radicals in diseases using animal models.
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Department of Pediatrics
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Clinical Immunodiagnostic and Research Laboratory (CIRL)
Location: MFRC-5072
Cost Structure: Fee-for-service
User Base: Limited to collaborating investigators
Website
The CIRL provides a comprehensive panel of diagnostic services using state-of-the-art flow cytometric instrumentation and the latest scientific discoveries to provide innovative methods in the detection, diagnosis and treatment assessment of immunologic, hematologic, and oncologic disease states. The CIRL is a Jeffrey Modell Diagnostic Center for Primary Immunodeficiency. CIRL participates in the College of American Pathologists (CAP) laboratory accreditation program and is federally licensed through CLIA (Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments) as a flow cytometry laboratory.
The CIRL helps support MCW and CHW investigator-initiated research protocols. Research protocols supported by the CIRL must be performed under an IRB approved protocol. Contact Dennis Schauer, Jr. for more information regarding available services and associated fees.
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Department of Physiology
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Department of Physiology Biochemical Analytical Laboratory
Location: BSB 536
Cost Structure: Fee-for-service for selected assays
User Base: Physiology faculty and their collaborators; Others for select services only
The biochemical analytical laboratory provides a consolidated, highly specialized, well equipped and professionally staffed analytical laboratory capable of performing a wide variety of immunoassays, HPLC based, clinical chemistry and biochemical analyses. The priority of this laboratory is to meet the analytical needs of members of the Department of Physiology and collaborating individuals. The laboratory is staffed by 3 full time technicians and is equipped with a Cobas Mir and Next autoanalyzers optimized for clinical chemistry analysis on small samples obtained from rodents, 7 fully automated HPLC systems equipped with UV, fluorescent, radiochemical and electrochemical detectors, fluorescent and absorbance plate readers, fluorometer, beta and gamma counters, centrifuges, flame photometers and atomic absorption spectroscopy. The laboratory does accept samples from outside users and performs a wide variety of clinical chemistry, EIA, RIA, electrolyte and second messenger analyses on a fee-for-service basis. Contact the lab manager, Lisa Henderson, for a complete list of the analytical services available and the fee schedule.
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Human and Molecular Genetics Center
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Human and Molecular Genetics Center
HMGC Homepage
PhysGen
Rat Genome Database
Macroarray Pipeline
Bioinformatics Program
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Proteomics Center
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MCW Proteomics Center
Location: TBRC
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: Collaborating investigators
The MCW Proteomics Center develops mass spectrometric methodologies and technology for the quantitative analysis of the entire proteome of a single cell. The goal is to dramatically increase the sensitivity, resolution and mass range of the analysis process and develop approaches for the processing of single cells into a form suitable for mass spectrometric analysis of their components. There are three components to the MCW Proteomics Center:
- The Animal Models and Experimental Systems Component develops, maintains and produces animal and cell culture models of angiogenesis for analysis (Contact: Dr. Andrew Greene).
- The Protein Analysis and Technology Implementation Component focuses on development of protein separation techniques, implementation of new MS technologies, analysis of consomic samples (Contact: Dr. Michael Olivier)
- The Bioinformatics Component focuses on data warehousing, implementation of data analysis and data mining tools, development of novel algorithms and databases in support of proteomic studies (Contact: Dr. Simon Twigger)
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Zablocki VA Medical Center
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Biomechanics Research Core
Location: VAMC 70-D-210
Cost Structure: Negotiable
User Base: Collaborating investigators
Website
Multiple specialty laboratories serve as "Biomechanics Research Core" facilities. There is a lab with two electrohydraulic pistons and a separate bending-moment apparatus that apply simple or complex loads to biological or material specimens of various sizes. A nine-camera 3D motion capture system can be used separately or in conjunction with the loading apparatus. A computational lab consists of multiple high-end computer work stations with 3D imaging software and finite element mechanics software. An occupant kinetics sled laboratory consists of a propulsion and deceleration sled hardware and associated equipment including high-speed digital video cameras, 200-channel data acquisition systems, and motion-tracking system. A vehicle crashworthiness laboratory includes a 500 ft track and barriers to conduct full-scale vehicle crashes. Several types of crash test dummies including the Hybrid-III and EuroSID dummies are available.
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Crystal ID Core
Location: VAMC 70-C-207
Cost Structure: Not specified
User Base: Collaborating investigators
The Crystal ID Laboratory specializes in the identification of crystalline materials in biologic samples, focusing on crystal-associated diseases such as kidney stone disease, crystal-associated lung diseases, and crystal-induced arthritis. The laboratory utilizes both high-resolution x-ray powder diffraction and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy as analysis methods. One of the strengths of the lab is the extensive library of standards that have been assembled for both XRD and FTIR during over 30 years of analyses. The laboratory can also analyze crystalline materials from animal models and from synthetic processes.
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Keck Animal Imaging Core
Location: VAMC 70-D-105
Cost Structure: Not specified
User Base: Collaborating investigators
The Keck Animal Imaging Core consists of a microfocal X-ray system and two gamma-ray imaging instruments. The microfocal X-ray instrument is a multipurpose system capable of micro-CT (computed tomography) and planar imaging with resolution below 100 microns. The gamma-ray imaging capability consists of two SPECT (single photon emission-CT) systems, a modified clinical Gamma camera and a newer multi-detector microSPECT instrument. All of these imaging systems were specifically designed for the study of small animals (<5kg) or their isolated organs. The instruments have an open architecture that makes them highly adaptable for imaging diverse experimental preparations and biological phenomena. Pulmonary physiology is a specific research interest of this facility, but studies in other organ systems can be done. Access to the Keck Animal Imaging Facility is on a collaborative basis.
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Imaging Station Core
Location: VAMC 70-C-106
Cost Structure: Not specified
User Base: Collaborating investigators
The Imaging Station Core consist of a Kodak IS2000MMT which can be used for white light photography, chemiluminescent detection (western blots), UV illumination utilizing the lid accessory (ethidium bromide gels), and other fluorescent dyes. Available filters are: 385, 465, 535, or 555 nm for excitation and: 440, 535, or 600 nm for emission. Other filters are available from the manufacturer (www.kodak.com/go/IS2000MM). Imaging is limited to a 20x20 cm platen size. Whole animal and tissue studies are possible, but have not yet been extensively investigated on the instrument. The Imaging Station Core also offers quantitative imaging of luminescent, fluorescent and colorimetric labeled biomolecules in a variety of assay formats including membranes, electrophoresis gels, plates, tissues and in-vivo assays. Users must be trained prior on the instrument. Use of the Imaging Station is on a collaborative basis with the on-line calendar used for all scheduling.
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