Grant: Research Tools and Instruments

A cryostat consists of an ultrafine "deli-slicer", called a microtome, which sits inside a freezer. The apparatus sits upright and it has an external wheel for rotating the microtome up and down. The temperature inside can be varied, depending on the tissue being cut, usually from -20 °C to -30 °C. This helps to keep the tissue in solid form so that it can be sliced accurately into sections, usually around 10 um thick, but this can vary depending on the downstream use of the sections. Sections of tissue are collected on microscope slides for subsequent staining or analyses. I am requesting funds for the acquisition of a cryostat suitable for the preparation of muscle samples for subsequent histological or molecular analyses. Muscle samples are obtained from rodent or human subjects, frozen carefully and then sectioned for analyses using the cryostat. This is the first step of a series of analytical techniques that can be performed once the tissue is sectioned. These include histochemistry, immunohistochemistry, and laser capture microdissection to analyze single fibers. These methods are useful to examine muscle adaptations to exercise, disease, disuse and aging, all of which form part of my NSERC DG funding. The equipment requested will replace my very old, broken cryostat obtained in 2003, 21 years ago, which has seen exhaustive use and is no longer supported by the manufacturer. It will be available to my 12 trainees as well as my Muscle Health Research Centre (MHRC) colleagues. Acquisition of this new cryostat is absolutely essential for us to progress in achieving our NSERC DG research goals. A delay in its acquisition will have a significant impact on our progress, as well as on the training of HQP. My laboratory is in high demand for MSc, PhD and post-doctoral opportunities, and I currently have 12 trainees on a yearly basis. The cryostat will allow me to train these HQP in producing tissue sections for sophisticated downstream analyses which will serve them well in academic, clinical and other research and analysis settings in the future. In addition, as the Founding Director of the MHRC, I am also submitting this application to help support the >30 other faculty members in the Department of Biology, the School of Kinesiology and Health Science, and the MHRC, with the goal of increasing our currently very limited capacity for tissue sectioning at York University.