Since the beginning of 2015 SciLifeLab has four additional facilities available to researchers throughout Sweden; one for mass cytometry and three for single cell analysis. Several facilities around the country will also be integrated in the center forward.
The three new single-cell facilities – one in Stockholm and two in Uppsala – together offer technologies that are unique in Europe. With the help of single cell analysis, researchers can study the properties of individual cells, unlike conventional biochemical and molecular biological methods which analyze whole tissue samples or microbiological populations.
“Few if any lab in the world has the skills and tools needed to do the complex analysis of individual cells that we can now offer at SciLifeLab”, according to Ulf Landegren, platform manager for one of the facilities, Single Cell Proteomics.
Facility for mass cytometry (CyTOF) consists of two units located in Stockholm and Linköping. Using mass cytometry, researchers can investigate proteins in individual cells. The technique is, among other things, used to characterize the different cells in a sample and to study the signaling pathways in cells affected by drugs. The facility also offers comprehensive data analysis to interpret the results of these experiments.
“We are also working to develop the mass cytometry technology further and to develop new assays and reagents as well as new tools for data analysis”, says Adnane Achour, who together with Jan-Ingvar Jönsson is platform superintendent of the facility Mass Cytometry.
Expanding to other locations
In addition to the four new facilities, SciLifeLabs platform for bioinformatics also is reinforced with several services in complex data analysis (Big Data), both in Stockholm/Uppsala and at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg. In 2016 new facilities for Electron Microscopy (Single-particle cryo-EM) will start in Stockholm and Umeå. Discussions are also underway with other universities around the country to integrate several satellite facilities (ie facilities in other locations than the main nodes Stockholm and Uppsala) in SciLifeLab.
For more information please contact:
Mathias Uhlén, Director SciLifeLab
mathias.uhlen@scilifelab.se
Gunnar von Heijne, WABI in Stockholm and Cryo-EM in Stockholm
gunnar@dbb.su.se