Continued support is requested for the NEI Core Grant for Vision Research that supports investigators of the Atlanta Vision Research Community (AVRC). This Center Grant renewal application includes three Resource/Service Cores: (1) Structural Biology and Imaging, (2) Functional Genomics and Proteomics, and (3) Bioinformatics and Biostatistics. The AVRC Core grant supports collaborative vision research and service among 21 faculty with 15 NEI funded R01s, 21 postdoctoral fellows, and 10 predoctoral fellows. This support comes largely via the expertise and service of AVRC personnel, their training of AVRC faculty and staff, and the availability of equipment, supplies, and other resources. In the past 5 years, the Core grant contributed to the generation of 200+ peer-reviewed publications and to many new and competing renewal NEI-funded R01s. The Structural Biology and Imaging Core provides resources and services for members of the AVRC with regard to determining the relationship between normal and abnormal structure of ocular structures in healthy tissue and in disease models with and without experimental therapies. Support is provided for structure- function studies with an emphasis on retinal function, retinal degeneration/injury, RPE morphometry, ocular oncology and gene/drug delivery. The Core supports ultrasonography, immunohistochemistry, confocal microscopy, fluorescence image analysis, and light and electron microscopy services. The goal of the Functional Genomics and Proteomics Core is to enhance research that increases our understanding of how biological function (e.g., vision) arises from the information encoded in an organism's genome and is modified by epigenetics. The Core supports molecular, biochemical, and phenotypic experiments via six sections: DNA/RNA services, protein/small molecule analysis, cell culture, and ocular/vision structural and functional analysis, rodent ocular microsurgery, and mouse colony services. Approaches include scanning laser ophthalmoscopy, partial coherence interferometry, SD-OCT, fundus imaging, precision micrometry, photorefraction, rebound tonometry, ERG, OKT, HPLC, LC-MS, PCR, LCM, immunoblotting and ELISA, flow-cytometry, protein sequencing, microarray analysis, and NexGen sequencing. The Bioinformatics and Biostatistics Core provides biostatistics, bioinformatics, data management, electronic notebooks, data backups, and advanced computational analyses. The support includes effort of Core-dedicated informaticists and statisticians, advanced software, and supercomputer access. The Core is administered by the Program Director and the Directors for each of the Cores. An Advisory Committee aids the Core directors to insure full and equitable use of the facilities and to advise on creation of new resources based on need or elimination of components that are underutilized. The Cores have increased and will continue to increase research productivity by providing common services to stimulate and facilitate collaborative studies among faculty and to attract other academic disciplines to vision research.
The AVRC Core facility serves as a centralized vision research resource in Atlanta where faculty from Emory University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Georgia State University, Morehouse School of Medicine, and The Atlanta Veterans Administration Medical Center can undertake joint studies in vision research. The Core facilitates the research of investigators holding NEI R01 grants by providing access to equipment and services that would not be possible on individual R01 grants. The Core facilities also serve a role in the research projects of pre- and postdoctoral fellows supported by our NEI Training Grant (T32 EY007092-29), recently renewed for five years (2015-2020).
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