microgen - core facility resource statement

The OUHSC Laboratory for Genomics and Bioinformatics (LGB) is a university-supported core facility; the Director of the LGB is Dr. Allison Gillaspy ( Department of Microbiology and Immunology). Currently, the LGB houses an two ABI3730xl capillary DNA sequencers, with a combined sequencing capacity of over 1Mb of raw sequence per day. We have recently acquired an ABI SOLiD short-read sequencer, with the capacity to generate 6Gb of data per run. This machine not only will provide ultrahigh-throughput sequencing for genome analysis, but also can be used for other applications, including transcriptomics, SNP analysis, and siRNA discovery. The facility also houses all of the essential robotics and ancillary equipment for a state-of-the-art genomics facility, including Beckman NX liquid-handling robot, Robbins Hydra 96 automated robotics workstation, thermal cyclers, and a Genomic Solutions GS3 colony picker/microarray spotter robot. These robots are used for template purification, fabrication and clean-up of DNA sequencing and PCR reaction mixes, and can be used for a variety of other high-throughput tasks, as need by core facility users. Microarray support is provided using Perkin-Elmer ScanArray Express and Combimatrix Electrasense array scanners, and an ABI 7500 Fast Real-Time machine for microarray data confirmation. This machine can also be used for a variety of other experiments, including SNP detection. Microarray experiments are supported by the use of the Agilent Bioanalyzer and the Nanodrop spectrophotometer. We offer high-capacity protein separation using the Beckman ProteomeLab PF2D, with the capacity to separate up to 5mg protein using two-dimensional liquid chromatography, as a front-end for proteomics analyses. A second newly acquired instrument, the Biacore T-100, exploits surface plasmon resonance to examine molecular interactions such as protein-protein, DNA-protein or other binding events. The LGB also has an Informatics Support Laboratory, which houses a several Dell servers, Sun V880 and x4500 servers with automated tape backups, for bioinformatics tasks such as DNA sequence assembly, analysis and annotation, and microarray data analysis. We also offer custom scripting services for users who need bioinformatics support for data retrieval and analysis.