Instrumentation

The CCM maintains a 300 sq. ft. fully equipped Histopathology Laboratory Service with automated tissue processing and embedding equipment, vented fume hoods, microtomes, and microscopes. This lab also contains a new ScanScope from Aperio Tech and computer support for the scanning of whole slide images (see Services). This includes a Zoomify compression workstation. The Center also contains a Zeiss AxioSkop that is equipped with the Axiocomera and the appropriate computer processing equipment; this microscope has fluorescence capability.

Flow cytometry instruments include: FACSCalibur and FACSAria (located at the California Primate Center Immunology Core, adjacent to the CCM) and Cytomation MoFlow flow cytometer (located in the Optical Biology Core, UC Davis - Tupper Hall - one mile from CCM). Data analysis is done using either Summit (Cytomation) or Flowjo (Treestar) software.

Two Multiplex Microbead Immunoassay Systems (Luminex, BioPlex), based on a 96-well format, are available with appropriate software for data analysis. Core staff can develop novel custom multiplex immunoassays because these systems feature a flexible, open-architecture design that can be configured to perform a wide variety of bioassays quickly, cost-effectively and accurately. In addition, calibrated commercial panels (kits) are available for simultaneous analysis of numerous protein analytes including cytokines, chemokines, and inflammatory mediators.

The Advanced Tissue Arrayer (Chemicon) at CCM provides researchers with an efficient, flexible tool for building custom tissue microarrays using pre-existing paraffin blocks. This instrument enables new approaches based on proteomic analyses of human and animal tissues.

A Laser-Capture Microdissection instrument (Molecular Machines & Industries AG, Zurich) at CCM enables the precise isolation of single cells or bacteria, or clusters of cells from histological slides.

Core labs at CCM contain two instruments for quantitative PCR (Taqman) assay (ABI Prism 7700 Sequence Detector - Perkin Elmer; ABI Prism 7900HT Sequence Detection System - Applied Biosystems).

The Typhoon Variable Mode Imager 9410 (Amersham, GE Healthcare) at CCM can detect an extensive variety of fluors and has capabilities for phosphor autoradiography and direct imaging of chemiluminescence.