Acquisition of a Biological Electron Microscope and Digital Camera System

一笔赠款已授予匹兹堡大学的指导下，博士苏珊R。Sesack资助购买一台带有数字摄影系统和外部显示器的生物电子显微镜。该仪器将使神经科学，生物科学和化学系的教师能够通过提供最先进的电子显微镜系统来实现和扩展他们的研究目标，该系统旨在提高分析复杂生物标本的效率和生产力，并以数字格式捕获图像。对于所有以生物学为基础的科学，关于生物体的精细结构细节的知识对于理解其功能至关重要，而获奖的电子显微镜将是可视化这种超微结构的主要手段。该仪器还将用于确定驱动适应性反应的环境操纵如何改变结构。此外，超微结构方法将与其他技术相结合，以确定对生物功能至关重要的分子的形状，分布和运输。最后，该系统的数字格式将大大提高图像采集和复制的效率，并大大加强自然科学教师的培训任务。该奖项支持的教师分布在多个部门，因此仪器将支持非常多样化的研究项目。简要清单包括：突触连接的超微结构研究，连接大脑区域调节行为，细胞过程和神经元信号传导的可塑性，调节神经传递的分子的定位，大脑神经化学物质的微量分析监测，肌肉的生物化学过程，细胞器的合成和组装，蛋白质的细胞内分子运输，蛋白质和细菌病毒的合成，组装和结构，染色体的组装和分离，以及分枝杆菌和DNA肿瘤病毒的分子生物学。在进行这项研究的过程中，教师将整合他们的实验研究，涉及仪器与新的科学家在博士后，博士，本科和高中水平的培训。图像采集的数字格式将特别有助于培训，因为它将提供教师和学生一起工作的标本的外部观察。该仪器还将用于教授细胞生物学和病毒学课程。该项目的科学重要性源于这样一个事实，即它提供了仪器，将促进大量成熟的研究人员的研究计划，他们的工作旨在提高对从病毒到人类的生物有机体的基本结构和功能的理解，包括正常和患病的细胞过程。该仪器的学术应用将有助于从传统代表和代表不足的群体中征聘和教育新的科学家。这样的教育目标将确保理科学生进入社会时更好地理解生物结构和功能，并坚信需要进行更多的研究来了解所有生物体、环境以及人体和大脑的内部运作。最后，仪器将加强整合研究和教学的基础设施，促进科学学科内部和跨学科的合作（例如，化学，生物学和神经科学），并有助于在科学界和外行社区内广泛传播超微结构研究的知识优势。

A grant has been awarded to the University of Pittsburgh under the direction of Dr. Susan R. Sesack to fund the purchase of a biological electron microscope with a digital photography system and external monitor. This instrumentation will enable faculty in the Departments of Neuroscience, Biological Sciences and Chemistry to achieve and expand their research objectives by providing a state-of-the-art electron microscope system that is designed to enhance the efficiency and productivity of analyzing complex biological specimens and to capture images in a digital format. For all biologically-based sciences, knowledge regarding the fine structural details of organisms is essential for understanding their function, and the awarded electron microscope will be a principal means for visualizing this ultrastructure. The instrumentation will also be used to determine how structure is altered by environmental manipulations that drive adaptive responses. Moreover, ultrastructural methods will be combined with other techniques to determine the shape, distribution and trafficking of molecules that are essential for biological functions. Finally, the digital format of the system will considerably increase the efficiency of image capture and reproduction and greatly enhance the training missions of faculty in the natural sciences. The faculty supported by this award are distributed across multiple departments, and so the instrumentation will support research programs that are quite diverse. A brief listing includes: ultrastructural investigation of synaptic connections that link brain regions regulating behavior, cellular processes and plasticity underlying neuronal signaling, localization of molecules regulating neurotransmission, microanalytical monitoring of brain neurochemicals, biochemical processes of muscle, synthesis and assembly of cellular organelles, intracellular molecular trafficking of proteins, synthesis, assembly and structure of proteins and bacterial viruses, assembly and segregation of chromosomes, and the molecular biology of mycobacteria and DNA tumor viruses. In the process of conducting this research, the faculty will integrate their experimental studies involving the instrumentation with the training of new scientists at the postdoctoral, doctoral, undergraduate, and high school levels. The digital format for image capture will be particularly instrumental in training, because it will provide external viewing of specimens by faculty and students working together. The instrumentation will also be used to teach courses in cell biology and virology. The scientific importance of this project stems from the fact that it provides instrumentation that will facilitate the research programs of a large number of well-established investigators whose work is designed to improve understanding of the basic structure and function of biological organisms ranging from viruses to humans and including both normal and diseased cellular processes. The academic applications of the instrumentation will facilitate both the recruitment and education of new scientists from both traditionally represented and underrepresented groups. Such educational objectives will ensure that students of science enter society with a better appreciation of biological structure and function and a conviction that more research is needed to understand all living organisms, the environment, and the inner workings of the human body and brain. Finally, the instrumentation will enhance the infrastructure that integrates research and teaching, foster collaborations within and across scientific disciplines (e.g., chemistry, biology, and neuroscience), and contribute to the broad dissemination of the intellectual benefits of ultrastructural research within the scientific and lay communities.