Flow Cytometry Core

Director: Zuhair K. Ballas, MD
Office: 48 EMRB
Phone: 1-319-335-8103

The 1,200-square foot Flow Cytometry Facility is located in the Eckstein Medical Research Building (EMRB). The facility has one magnetic-based and eight laser-based instruments whose major purpose is the identification and isolation of cell populations.

The two cell sorters are the Becton Dickinson Aria II and the Becton Dickinson FACS Aria Fusion that both operate in a biological safety hood allowing sorting of live human cells and cells exposed to infectious agents. The facility also has three Becton Dickinson LSR II instruments for multi-color flow cytometry analysis, a BioRad Bioplex (Luminex 200s), a Miltenyi autoMACS and two Cytek Auroras. The cell sorters are operated by dedicated technicians Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. and other instruments are available 24/7 upon suitable training.

The facility provides scientific and technical personnel who are available for consultation in designing experimental protocols and training in the use of bench-top instruments and software programs for the interpretation and analysis of data. Cell preparation protocols are available on the facility’s website and publication quality output is available upon request.

Offline data analysis using SpectroFloTM, FlowJoTM, DiVaTM, and ModFITTM is accomplished through the facility's system of networked computers equipped with correspondingly maintained licenses. Data are also accessible remotely through the facility's dedicated file servers, which provide data storage for at least ten years.