Grant: Research Tools and Instruments

The Perkin-Elmer (P-E) Ultraview VoX spinning disk confocal microscope is a workhorse instrument for detecting fluorescent proteins, such as green fluorescent protein (GFP), in living cells. We use the P-E Spinning Disk confocal microscope in studies of how cellulose is made in plant cells, for examining plant cells during growth and development, and for investigating plants' and animals' responses to stress. The current microscope is seven years old, and it is beginning to fall behind international standards due to its outdated camera, broken stage (sample holder), and aging lasers. Because the current microscope is outdated, it cannot be used for live cell imaging for very rapid events. As this workhorse microscope ages, we are increasingly facing problems. In order to collect the data for his Ph.D., and his subsequent Science paper, UBC Botany student Yoshi Watanabe was forced to go to Stanford University to use their spinning disk confocal. Our spinning disk requires upgrades to the laser, the stage, the optics, and the camera. The microscope is housed in, and managed by, the UBC Bioimaging Facility, a campus-wide biological imaging facility. UBC Bioimaging Facility provides top-end light and electron microscopy infrastructure to more than 100 research groups from 25 UBC departments. Upgrades to the spinning disk confocal will benefit many HQP from across campus. There were 30 HQP using the microscope in 2014-2015, from Botany (Samuels, Haughn, Douglas, Kunst, Wasteneys labs), Forestry (Mansfield, Bohlmann labs), Pediatrics (Maxwell lab), Microbiology and Immunology (Hancock lab), Chemistry (Perrin lab), and Zoology (Brauner, Milsom, Auld labs). The many on-going projects that rely on this equipment generate the urgency of this request.