The purpose of this proposal is to develop a core facility that will meet the major shared laboratory needs of a Head Injury Research Program devoted to studies of traumatic brain injury (TBI). The Core Facility will provide a centralized site for production of experimental TBI in rats by highly skilled personnel employing rigorously standardized protocols. The Core Facility will also perform standardized behavioral assessments, limited studies of cerebral blood flow and will process brain tissue for various histological procedures. The facility will also provide a central computerized laboratory database. Thus, the Core Facility will have several functions: 1) Production of experimental brain injury that is comparable across all experimental applications. the facility will employ models of moderate (fluid percussion) and severe (cortical impact) TBI developed in our laboratories. The facility will employ carefully trained and supervised personnel to provide a central surgical facility for preparation of rats and production of TBI. 2) Standardized behavioral assessments to insure consistency of injury and to compare with data derived from other experiments. The relevance of behavioral data to human TBI is periodically reviewed with neurosurgeons (Dr. Guy L. Clifton) and with neuropsychologists (Dr. Julia Hannay). 3) General histological processing of brain tissue for a variety of applications by each laboratory project (e.g. In situ hybridization, immunohistochemistry, light histological stains). Dr. Robert Gillman from University of Texas Medical Branch and Dr. Clay Goodman from Baylor College of Medicine will assist in interpretation of histopathological changes. 4) Compilation of a centralized computer database that will allow systematic comparisons of behavioral outcome measures between injury types and injury magnitudes. The system will also track the status of individual experiments handled by the Core Facility.
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