University of California San Diego Neuroscience Microscopy Imaging Core

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PROJECT SUMMARY / ABSTRACT The Neuroscience Microscopy Imaging Core at the UCSD School of Medicine has been fortunate to be funded continuously by the NINDS P30 program during the program’s existence from 2003 to 2021. NINDS has decided to sunset the program and this P30 grant is no longer renewable. P30 funding in the past 18 years has been instrumental in supporting the building of a world class microscopy facility that serves the microscopy imaging needs of our excellent research programs funded by NINDS, NIH, and other federal funding agencies across the entire UCSD campus. We have over 100 active user labs at any given time, with >40 labs funded by NINDS. Focusing on one type of tools in serving a large user base allows our core to operate with great efficiency. Our core is leading among the 25 or so NINDS funded P30 centers around the country in the number of supported publications. The funding of our core was considered a best value for shared facility funding in programmatic reviews. As our core transitions into a post-P30 era, we will continue to strive to meet the microscopy imaging needs of our faculty by seeking alternative funding sources, leveraging vendor relations and institutional support. We have already started to make efforts on these fronts. Nevertheless, this transition will not be painless, as resources supported by the P30 are not easily replaceable. To ease this transition and to provide a bridge to the future, we request an end-of-the-grant-cycle P30 supplement to provide a cushion so that resources previously provided by P30 will be gradually replaced by other means in the next year. This supplement will be used to support personnel, instrument repair and supplies during this transition period. We thank the NINDS for considering this supplement and for providing the P30 funding mechanisms for the past 18 years. In future, our core will continue to support the mission of the NINDS by serving a wide range of outstanding research programs that aim to gain fundamental knowledge of the nervous system and to reduce the burden of neurological diseases.