Overview of Core Facilities and Their Infrastructure

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Overview of Core Facilities and Their
Infrastructure

• Nancy D. Denslow, Ph.D.
• Association of Biomolecular Resource Facilities
• Executive Board Member

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ABRF
Mission The Association of Biomolecular Resource
Facilities is an international society dedicated
to advancing core and research biotechnology
laboratories through research, communication, and
education. Membership Core Facilities
(Academic, Industry, Government) Service
Providers Independent Research
Institutes Academic researchers (not in core
facilities)
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ABRF
Mission The Association of Biomolecular Resource
Facilities is an international society dedicated
to advancing core and research biotechnology
laboratories through research, communication, and
education. Membership Core Facilities
(Academia, Industry, Government) Service
Providers Independent Research
Institutes Academic researchers (not in core
facilities)
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Current Biotechnology Core Facilities

• Proteomics
• Protein identification
• Post-transl. modifications
• Protein sequencing
• Protein profiling
• Peptide Synthesis
• Protein Production Purific.
• DNA Technologies
• DNA sequencing
• Fragment Analysis
• Nucleic Acids
• Oligonucleotide synthesis
• Q-PCR

• Microarrays
• Commercial arrays
• Spotted arrays
• Hybridoma
• Cell based technologies
• Laser dissection
• Cell arrays
• EM
• Molecular Interactions
• BIAcore
• Microcalorimetry
• Analytical Ultracentrifugation

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Core Laboratories Total Staff Degree Breakdown
ABRF survey-2003
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Core support varies by institute

• 100 institutional support
• Partial subsidy
• No subsidy

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Cost Recovery From User Fees
ABRF survey-2003
Industrial and CRO labs not included. Industrial
labs were internally subsidized and CRO labs rely
exclusively on user fees.
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Cost Recovery Formula

• Depends on core level of support
• Should include funds for
• Salaries
• Instrument depreciation
• Instrument service contracts
• Consumables
• Percentage for instrument failures
• Development of new methods
• Staff development and training

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Core Lab

• Standard service provider
• New methods development
• Research based/Discovery driven

• Academic Core Lab
• Advancement of technology
• Specific research needs
• Student training

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New Instrument Acquisition

• Direct institutional funding
• Savings from instrument depreciation costs
• NIH/NSF/DOD grants
• NIH-NSF co-funding grants
• Leasing instrument

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Instrumentation acquisition by grants

• NIH
• 5-10 NIH funded investigators
• Documented need for instrument
• Biomedical research focus
• Documented expertise
• 1 yr waiting time

• NSF
• Broad based research group
• Educational component
• Documented need
• Non-biomedical research
• Institutional commitment for cost sharing
• 6 months waiting time

NIH-NSF Co-funding of Major Instrumentation
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Innovative Science New Directions

• Discovery driven research
• Hypothesis driven research
• Interdisciplinary collaboration
• Computational biology
• Cross-platform data sharing
• Systems biology approach

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New Interdisciplinary ResearchRole of Core
Facilities

• Understand technology to acquire proper equipment
• Purchasing of shared instrumentation
• Training staff in new methodology
• Educational role teaching members of
  interdisciplinary team the common language
• Interaction with bioinformatics specialists
• Seed money to get project going
• Faculty vision

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Role of scientists in core labs

• Project success will depend on staff
• Are staff recognized as scientist colleagues?
• Are staff given credit for developing the
  project?
• Are staff in professional career tracks?
• Are staff properly compensated?

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Role for Professional Societies

• Support scientists in core facilities
• Introduce new technologies in a non-intimidating
  atmosphere.
• Serve as a resource for troubleshooting,
  instrument satisfaction, technology evaluation
• Provide well characterized test samples on an
  annual basis
• Networking
• Professional advancement of members
  professional career tracks for core staff

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Learn more about ABRF

• Visit our web site www.abrf.org
• Attend our annual conference
• Obtain latest study results from research groups
• Read and submit manuscripts to the Journal of
  Biomolecular Techniques (JBT)
• Join our web-based discussion forum