The primary objective of the Immune Analysis Core is to establish standardized assays of cellular and humoral immune responses for the immunotherapeutic approaches being developed and tested in Individual Research Projects 1, 2 and 3 of the RPCI Ovarian Cancer SPORE. It will be also be responsible for enumerating and characterizing myeloid derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) by flow cytometry for Research Projects 4. The Core will routinely provide Ovarian Cancer SPORE investigators with high quality, state-of-the- art flow cytometry, cellular monitoring by ELISPOT, proliferation and cytotoxicity assays, and multiplex cytokine bead array.
The specific aims of the Immune Analysis Core are to: 1) Provide cell banking services for immune monitoring assays requiring viable mononuclear cells. 2) Provide state-of-the-art, multi-color, fluorescence activated cell sorting and analytical support for Individual Research Projects, Career Development and Developmental Research Projects. This includes high-speed sorting and multi-color analysis of cellular subsets. 3) Provide state-of-the-art ELISPOT, ELISA, proliferation and cytotoxicity assays for the functional characterization of antigen-specific T cell responses. 4) Provide state-of-the-art patient sample handling and assessment of immune responses, with standardized SOPs, quality assurance, quality control and data management practices to monitor assay performance and validate data quality. In addition to these established immunoassays services, the Immune Analysis Core will be instrumental in developing new methodologies and making them available to the SPORE investigators. It also has a significant educational role, working with all SPORE investigators including PI's, technicians and young investigators on their assay development, proper use of instrumentation and interpretation of their data.
Centralization and standardization of the performance of the immunoassays will facilitate head-to-head comparisons of the immunological therapies being tested using the same outcome measures and provide for more efficient use of the SPORE's resources.
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