Supplement to the TUSM/T-NEMC Center Core for Neuroscience Research

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This is a supplemental application requesting funds to add instrumentation and personnel to an existing NINDS-funded center core (the Tufts Center for Neuroscience Research, CNR). Several qualifying center members and other NINDS-funded investigators at Tufts University School of Medicine and Tufts-New England Medical Center (Tufts-NEMC) have a need to employ high-density Affymetrix gene arrays in expression profiling studies. Although an expression array core exists at Tufts (the Tufts-NEMC Expression Array Core, TEAC), this facility only includes equipment for generating and analyzing cDNA or oligonucleotide gene arrays; it does not provide instrumentation for Affymetrix chip hybridization, washing and scanning. Indeed, there is not a single Affymetrix system within any department of Tufts University or Tufts-NEMC. We provide preliminary data and justifications for supplemental funds to purchase a complete Affymetrix system. The new Affymetrix system will be located within the existing TEAC facility; it will dovetail well with an existing bioinformatics core that is currently funded by our center grant. Our bioinformatics core currently provides microarray data analysis services to center members and other investigators who perform gene-profiling studies. In addition to instrumentation, this application requests salary support for a technician to maintain the new Affymetrix system and conduct experiments for NINDS and other investigators. The technician will be supervised by Dr. Dale Hunter, who serves as director of both the bioinformatics and the TEAC core facilities, as well as Ms. Lan Wei, the manager of the TEAC facility. The introduction of an Affymetrix system at Tufts University will complement existing expression array facilities and provide significant added value to the research programs of NINDS-funded investigators and other scientists at Tufts University and Tufts-NEMC.