ANALYTICAL EQUIPMENT IN THE PEF

The PEF recently acquired a new cell analysis system from Innovatis Inc. The instrument, Cedex HiRes performs a high resolution scan of cells flowing through a 300µl etched glass chamber. Sophisticated software analyzes the digital images of the cells: size and brightness of each cell and provides a total cell count from 150 images, a cell density in cells/ml, a viable cell density based on trypan blue exclusion, the size of the cells along with a histogram of the distribution of the cell sizes.

Resolution of the scanner is 0.8 microns / pixel. All 150 images are stored and can be examined one at a time along with a comparison of the software’s “call” for each cell. All data can be viewed within 3 minutes on the computer monitor and is saved for later comparison to previous and future samples.

The PEF also has more conventional analytical equipment including electrophoresis set-ups and power supplies to examine protein products. and inverted phase contrast microscopes with the capability of both digital and film microscopy.

Realtime digital microscopy with a monitor display is a major aid in training new cell culture workers.  In the common use facility, two Nanodrop instruments are useful for PEF work. The standard absorbance model is located in the in the 5^th floor common use area and can be used to measure DNA and RNA concentrations for DNA transfections. In the PBF adjacent to the PEF suite the fluorescent Nanodrop can measure media supernatants for secretion of GFP labeled secreted proteins.