Acquisition of an Analytical Centrifuge

描述（由申请人提供）：建议从Beckman-Coulter购买ProteomeLab XL-I分析超离心机（AU）。该仪器将明确服务于四个主要和五个次要用户的研究项目，这些用户来自整个校园的一系列部门。新的非盟项目的发展也期待着来自该机构强大的、主要由美国国立卫生研究院资助的生命科学界的一批额外研究人员的参与。虽然该机构的多位研究人员进行了分析性超离心实验，但这项工作仅在校外收费的服务设施或通过合作进行，因为在这所大学或纳什维尔附近的任何其他地方都没有可用的仪器。最近的仪器位于孟菲斯的圣裘德儿童医院，距离200多英里。对于有限数量的研究人员进行的明确界定的具体研究项目，使用场外服务设施的费用就足够了。然而，随着所需实验数量的增加，成本也在迅速增长。此外，一些样品不适合运离现场，当需要联系外部团体执行服务时，常规分析和项目开发受到抑制。当地非盟设施的可用性，结合一个现成的机制来宣传资源，并通过结构生物学中心与感兴趣的科学家合作，将对美国国立卫生研究院资助的基础和转化研究产生广泛的积极影响。公共卫生相关性：分析性超离心机的可用性将意味着范德比尔特大学医学和生物学研究人员全面解决有关正常细胞中特定蛋白质的作用及其在疾病状态下功能失调的问题的能力的巨大飞跃。分析性超离心被广泛认为是表征生物大分子的重要工具，促进了包括生物化学、癌症生物学、细胞生物学、发育生物学、免疫学、微生物学、药理学和结构生物学在内的各个领域的研究项目。范德比尔特生命科学社区的研究小组主要致力于人类健康的研究和对抗疾病的治疗策略的发展，而在校园内使用非盟将大大提高研究小组的生产力。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Purchase of a ProteomeLab XL-I analytical ultracentrifuge (AU) from Beckman-Coulter is proposed. This instrument will explicitly serve the research programs of four major and five minor users from a range of departments across the campus. The development of new AU projects is also anticipated from a cadre of additional investigators from the strong, largely NIH-funded life sciences community at this institution. While multiple investigators at this institution perform analytical ultracentrifugation experiments, this work has been exclusively performed at off-site fee for service facilities or through collaboration because there is no instrument available at this university or anywhere else in the Nashville vicinity. The closest instrument is located at St. Jude Children's Hospital in Memphis, more than 200 miles away. Use of off-site fee for service facilities is sufficient for specific well-defined research projects by a limited number of investigators. However, the costs grow rapidly as the number of experiments needed increases. Moreover, some samples are not amendable to transportation off site, and routine analysis and project development is inhibited when it is necessary to contact outside groups to perform the service. The availability of a local AU facility combined with a ready mechanism to advertise the resource and work with interested scientists through the Center for Structural Biology will have a broad positive impact on NIH-sponsored basic and translational research at our institution. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The availability of an analytical ultracentrifuge will mean a dramatic leap forward in the ability of medical and biological researchers at Vanderbilt University to comprehensively address questions about the roles of specific proteins in normal cells and their mis-function in disease states. Analytical ultracentrifugation is broadly viewed as an important tool for characterization of biological macromolecules, fueling research programs in a variety of areas including Biochemistry, Cancer Biology, Cell Biology, Developmental Biology, Immunology, Microbiology, Pharmacology, and Structural Biology. The availability of AU on campus will significantly enhance the productivity of the research groups in the Vanderbilt life sciences community, which is largely devoted to studies of human health and development of therapeutic strategies to combat disease.