The Flow Cytometry Core Facility (FCCF) at the West Virginia University (WVU) School of Medicine is a centralized institutional shared research resource facility that broadly serves the research community at WVU and other regional institutions, and is operated in accordance with contemporary principles in management of institutional shared research facilities. The main priority of the FCCF is to support NIH- funded projects in biomedical research, including research funded with grants from NIGMS/NCRR""""""""s Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (CoBRE) and the Idea Network for Biomedical Research Excellence (INBRE) programs. Major instrumentation in the FCCF consists of a 2-laser Becton Dickinson (BD) FACSCalibur analytic flow cytometer, which was purchased with Institutional funds as part of WVU""""""""s commitment to biomedical research and has been in operation since 2002, and a 3-laser BD FACSAria cell sorter, which was purchased in 2006 with an NIH Shared Instrumentation Grant. The current proposal describes a plan to replace the FACSCalibur with an LSRFortessa. This upgrade will benefit the research community in 3 tangible ways. It will: 1) enable researchers to shift some of their analytic work from the capable but more expensive FACSAria cell sorter, thereby improving overall efficiency and reducing costs to individual investigators;2) improve the quality of the data being generated in the FCCF because of the advanced technology provided by the LSRFortessa;and 3) improve availability of analytic services in the FCCF because the FACSCalibur has, over the past 2 years, developed a history of chronic breakdowns despite diligent maintenance and careful oversight by FCCF scientists, as well as exhaustive efforts by Becton Dickinson service technicians.
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