The Bioreagent and Cell Culture Core continues to reorganize in order to respond to priority requests from investigators and to assure stringent cost-effectiveness. As a result, the Core's budget now operates with the same budget that was approved for five years ago even though the cost of reagents increased significantly and the number of investigators served increased 50%. The following services are provided: 1) growing cells in large quantities using a BioReactor, suspension or roller bottle cultures;2) preparing monoclonal antibodies;3) performing tests for mycoplasma contamination using an enzyme assay from Cambrex or the PCR method and curing contaminated cell lines;4) producing LB agar plates with antibiotics; 5) performing or assisting with CytoTox 96 cytotoxicity assays;6) quality testing before bulk purchase of fetal bovine serum, bovine calf serum, charcoal treated or dialyzed serum and making it available at substantial savings;7) testing and bulk purchasing the most commonly used cell culture media for distribution and preparation of only the unusual, high priced media or commercially unavailable media with substantial savings;8) large scale preparation of cell culture additives like Trypsin-EDTA, Hepes buffer, penicillin/streptomycin;9) centralized management and distribution of reagents for molecular biology from Sigma-Aldrich Co. and Roche Biotech Co.;and 10) performing special sterilization procedures, monitoring autoclaves, water quality, assisting in testing sterile hoods, incubator decontamination and calibration, training new technicians or graduate students in specialized techniques used in cell culture. This Core opened 35 years ago and provided uninterrupted service ever since. It is one of the longest standing and most widely used shared resources with distribution facilities in six locations: two in the Norris Headquarter Buildings (Ezralow and Hariyne Norris Research Tower) and one in each the Cancer Research Laboratories, the Hoffman Medical Research building, the Clinical Sciences Building, and the Children?s Hospital Los Angeles. Currently 113 faculty members utilize the services annually. More than 80% of the users are Cancer Center members with peer-reviewed grant support. The services provide substantial savings of 35% to 55% for the investigators. The Core supports all cancer related research that requires in vitro experiments by preparing and distributing reagents used in cell cultures and in molecular biology, and by performing technically challenging culture procedures and quality control assays. The Core is regularly reviewed by an Oversight Committee and frequently modified to suit the investigators'needs.
The Core supports cancer research by providing investigators and researchers access to bioreagents used in their studies, as well as technically challenging cell culture procedures and quality control assays at substantially reduced pricing.
Showing the most recent 10 out of 842 publications
