The JABSOM Genomics Core Facility offers genomic services, experimental advice, and data analysis to researchers of the Hawaiian Islands. To date we have processed samples from over 66 individual users from multiple sites including Chaminade University, UH Manoa, UH Hilo, JABSOM, Queens and Leahi Hospitals, and the Cancer Research Center. Total invoices, in both number and dollar amount, have steadily increased on a yearly basis since the creation of the Core in March of 2009. Our major services of qPCR, Sequencing, and Microarray Hybridization are each trending steadily upwards each year. A careful evaluation of costs and recharge recovery suggests that with continued moderate growth of the activity in the Core we can achieve break-even fiscal performance after 5 years. The Core is run by a talented Manager, Steffen Oeser, who worked for 8 years at lllumina in genomic technologies. In addition to genomic services the Core provides education to users and maintains the skills of its staff. In order to enhance the offerings of the Core in this cycle of COBRE funding we have established a collaboration with the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute. The provision of sophisticated informatic expertise should increase the value of the Core offerings, especially microarray data. We also have a component of innovation in the Core, provided largely by projects of a new Assistant Professor, and COBRE young investigator, Chad Walton. These include a bioinformatic approach to ligand selection, a potential improvement in SNP identification by a gradient melt-off, and work on a field-effect transistor that will allow us to test the capability of the ligand-prediction algorithm to generate a peptide that will bind to troponin for diagnosis of cardiac damage. Transitional COBRE support will firmly establish this core as a sustainable resource for crucial genomic services that are necessary for a molecular understanding of disease.
The Genomics Core is a valuable resource for the Cardiovascular COBRE, the Medical School, and a growing number of investigators around the State. It has brought convenient, inexpensive, reliable genomic services to the new Medical School campus and is a necessary element in the transformation of our school into a research-centric institution that focuses on generating new knowledge to treat disease.
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