Instrumentations

The cell culture suite includes dedicated -80⁰C and 4⁰C refrigeration. Ten Sanyo CO2 cell culture incubators, one 4 ft laminar flow biosafety cabinet, and four 6 ft laminar flow biosafety cabinets. One six foot laminar flow biosafety cabinet is equipped with a Nikon TS100 inverted microscope for sterile manual picking of iPSC colonies. It is equipped with phase contrast optics and a DsFi1 camera for digital acquisition.

This system delivers nucleic acids and proteins directly into many different cell types via electroporation and cell specific and optimized protocols. It is used in the UTSA stem cell core to reprogram cells using episomal plasmids and for delivering CRISPR reagents for genomic editing.

In addition to use in routine laboratory procedures this ultracentrifuge is used for the concentration of viral particles for injection tracing in animal studies as well as use in reprogramming of somatic cells.

This cryogenic freezer is for the storage of samples received and generated by the stem cell core. It has capacity for 15,000 1 or 2 ml vials and maintains -150° C storage (below the glass point of water) without the need for liquid nitrogen. It is connected to emergency power and an alarm system for the protection of samples.

The stem cell core uses this biorepository software to inventory and track all biological samples received or generated in the stem cell core. It is completely traceable and expandable.

This microscope is equipped with 40x, 60x and 100x high numerical aperture objectives, light source, filter wheels and dichroic mirrors to enable simultaneous 4 color imaging. It is also equipped with a Weather Station live cell imaging system with incubator for 37⁰ C work and ability to provide 5% CO2 to samples at the stage. The weather station allows is to maintain pluripotent cells on the stage indefinitely.

This system including head stage, computer and acquisition and analysis software allows for the simultaneous recording of extracellular fields in up to 96 wells (3 electrodes in each well. This permits the high throughput acquisition of electrophysiological data from cultured cells as well as brain slices. The stem cell core currently uses this apparatus for measuring the electrical activity of 2D and 3D cultures of neuronally differentiated pluripotent stem cells. It is also used for drug screening of iPSC derived cardiomyocytes for toxicity.

This system allows for the fluid based fluorescent sorting of single cells into 96 or 384 well plates for clonal selection and propagation.