Facilities

Laboratory

Five laboratory rooms with a total of 3,000 sq. ft. One room handles processing of materials for/from animal studies, one for working with infectious agents only, another has instrumentation and storage, the fourth for media preparation and formulations and the last is general lab space, including small inner rooms for analytical chemistry, molecular biology, media preparation and cell culture.

Laboratory Equipment: Spiral Biotech color colony counter, spiral bacterial autoplating system, LCQ Deca LC/MS, Surveyor HPLC, CO₂ incubators, standard incubators, low & hi-speed refrigerated centrifuges, cell harvester, stereomicroscope, fluorescent and light microscopes with phase contrast, AutoMACS for cell isolation, three Cepheid SmartCycler blocks for Real-time PCR, -80˚C freezers, AlphaInnotech 8900 imaging station (light, UV and chemoluminenscence) with image capture and densitometry software, Nano-pure water purification system, ELISA plate reader interfaced with computer, two 96 well thermalcyclers, hybridization oven, Experion Analyzer (Bio-RAD), tissue homogenizer for RNA isolation, liquid nitrogen chamber, shaker incubators, laminar flow hoods, balances, cell harvester, Luminex multiplex liquid array system, electroporator, cell counter, cryostat. In department: Ultracentrifuges, Speed-Vac, scintillation counter, electroporator, phosphoimager, lyopholyzer, fluorescent plate reader, autoclave, fluorescent and light microscopes with digital cameras interfaced with a computer, and luminometer, Whitley A35 and DG350 anaerobic chambers.

For cell analysis, the department has flow cytometers (Coulter FCS 500, BD LSR2) with 24 hour access. For cell sorting, we have a Cytopeia Influx sorter with two lasers. There is also a Zeiss confocal microscope facility on campus.

Animal Facility

The HSC Animal Facility is registered with the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), and USDA personnel periodically inspect both the facility and the program. The HSC Animal Facility is a member in good standing with the Association for Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care International (AAALAC) and AAALAC representatives inspect both the facility and the program every three years