The requested equipment consists of a Beckman-Coulter Optima XPN-100 Biosafe ultracentrifuge, with a Type 70 Ti fixed angle rotor and a SW-60 Ti swinging bucket rotor. The instrument will be used by the following nine VA investigators and their labs: Nicholas Webster, Ph.D., Robert Terkeltaub, Ph.D., Sushil Mahata, Ph.D., Robert Parmer, M.D., Ru Bryan, Ph.D., John Guatelli, M.D., Nai-Wen Chi, M.D., Bruce Zuraw, M.D., Isabel Newton, M.D., Ph.D. The following five VA-Merit funded projects will benefit from the ultracentrifuge: VA Merit Review I01BX002709 (P.I. Webster) 10/01/15-09/30/19 ?SRSF3 Loss and Hepatocellular Carcinoma? VA Merit Review (P.I. Mahata) 10/01/17-09/30/21 ?Catestatin improves glucose homeostasis and insulin sensitivity in diet-induced obese mice? VA Merit I01BX002234 (P.I. Bryan) 10/1/14?9/30/18 ?AMPK as an Interventional Target to Suppress the Development of Osteoarthritis? VA Merit I01 BX001660-05A2 (P.I. Terkeltaub) 04/01/17-03/31/21 ?Innate inflammation in osteoarthritis? VA Merit I01 BX002026-01A1 (P.I. Parmer) 04/01/13-03/31/17 ?Cell surface plasminogen activation and hypertension? In addition, multiple other VA-based, NIH or DOD-funded projects will benefit from the ultracentrifuge.
High-speed ultracentrifuges are an essential component of modern research labs. They are work-horse instruments that have been used extensively for VA research over the past 30 years. Our current instrument is 27 years old and has logged ~10,000 hours, and is now in need of replacement as it is broken and irrepairable. The new Optima Biosafe centrifuges have an additional advantage in that they can be used for biohazardous samples, which will increase the safety of VA investigators, as containment of biological samples is of paramount importance.!
