New Equipment Available for ACES Researchers

A microfluidics-based system for sizing, quantitation and quality control of DNA, RNA, proteins and cells on a single platform.  The ImageQuant LAS 4010 is an imaging system for gels, blots and bacterial colonies that detects chemiluminescence, UV, visible and infrared fluorescence (including Quantum Dots) as well as ethidium bromide, silver and Coomassie-staining.

Three units of indirect calorimeters for determining gas exchange for animals. This equipment is necessary to determine net energy of diets and feed ingredients, amino acid oxidation of diets, and animal reactions to changes in dietary and environmental conditions.

Centrifuge rotors that enable the applications of nanoparticles and techniques for nutrition research.

This free-standing MRI equipment is a composition analyzer for rodents and other samples (eggs) up to 700 g. It estimates free water, body water, body fat and lean mass in live animals without anesthetization.

The Lachat Quickchem is a flow-injection analyzer to measure concentrations of ionic species in soils and waters.

Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) for measuring metabolic fluxes, fingerprinting target metabolites, and identifying unknown compounds in various model systems (microorganism, plant, animal, and human).

36 Compute Nodes, 432 cores, 1.4 terabytes RAM, 20 Terabytes Additional Storage

High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) permits quantification of compounds (i.e., metabolites or biomarkers) related to carbohydrate, protein, and vitamin chemistry.

The ultra-high sensitivity Agilent ICP-MS is capable of measuring multiple isotopes of multiple elements in a single sample. It is also coupled to a novel system for chromatographic analysis of mercury species.

Illumina Beadarray technology applications include expression analysis, SNP genotyping for genome‐wide association studies, QTL mapping, copy number variations, and methylation analysis. Illumina provides off‐the‐shelf high‐density SNP Beadarrays for maize, Arabidopsis, human, bovine, canine, sheep, and pig with additional assays planned as genome sequence becomes available.

Modified Ussing Chambers allow for measurement of ion and nutrient transport using electrophysiological principals.

The nanophotometer is used to measure nucleic acids, proteins and cell density; The breath analyzer is used  to measure metabolites by non-invasive methods in children and adults; The nutrition software tools are used to measure nutrient intake analysis  and there is a software program that allows integration of several platforms and integration in systems biology pathways.

The Research Track Sprayer is designed for precision application of pesticides to plants.

UV/Vis/NIR Spectrophotomer has the ability to track, to calculate and store data and is required to determine concentrations of a variety compounds contained in foods, feeds and raw materials; in enzymatic and oxidative reactions; and to identify and quantify the various pigments which affect appearance. It can also be used in the reflectance mode to determine reflection at pre-selected wavelengths and use them to calculate commonly used color terms (L*, a*, b*, delta E, chroma).