Developmental Biology

The transgenic mouse core facility operates under the direction of Richard Lang, PhD, to generate transgenic mice by pronuclear microinjection and chimeric mice using embryonic stem cells. The facility has also undertaken several new initiatives including cryopreservation of transgenic lines and start-to-finish gene targeting. The facility provides consultation services and instruction in basic molecular biology techniques to researchers and trainees beginning to use these tools. Questions should be directed to Sandy Falcone, alexandra.falcone@cchmc.org.

The Microarray Core facility is operated under the supervision of S. Steven Potter, PhD. Microarrays allow a global, sensitive, and quantitative analysis of gene expression. Essentially all genes are represented on the arrays. Transcripts with only a few copies per cell are detected. Quantitative readouts of expression levels are provided. Only nanograms of total RNA per sample are required. The Microarray Core offers both the Affymetrix and Illumina platforms. The user provides the sample RNA, and the core performs a series of biochemical reactions to generate labeled target material to hybridize to the arrays. Several target amplification options are offered. The core provides advice on experimental design, RNA purification procedures, and data analysis.

The overall mission of the Pluripotent Stem Cell Facility (PSCF) is to facilitate all aspects of pluripotent stem cell experimentation and contribute to advancing stem cell therapies for human disease. The PSCF is dedicated to providing high quality, well characterized, and reliably archived human embryonic stem cells for distribution to researchers. Additionally, the facility will provide investigators with expert training in the protocols and techniques for proper handling and manipulation of human embryonic stem cells. Our objectives are to: 1) Establish a bank of well characterized, quality controlled human embryonic stem cells (hESCs); 2) Provide reagents and expertise for the generation of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs); 3) Provide training in the culture and manipulation of hESCs and iPSCs; and 4) Utilize and develop protocols for directed hESC/iPSC differentiation. We will make these cells available to Cincinnati researchers and will assist investigators in experimental design, data analysis and interpretation, and provide support for manuscript and grant proposal development.