Carolinas Medical Center

CMC

UNC Charlotte and the Carolinas Medical Center have collaborated to bring laboratory resources for high-throughput molecular biology research to the Charlotte Area. Available facilities on the CMC campus include mass spectroscopy and Affymetrix microarray processing.

Mass Spectrometer and Proteomics Facility

The Mass Spectrometer and Proteomics Facility is a joint project by UNC Charlotte and Carolinas Medical Center (CMC) researchers and funded by NC Biotechnology Center and Carolinas HealthCare System. The facility is located in Cannon Research Center at CMC. The facility is directed by Dr. Sunil Hwang and operated by the CMC staff (Tel: 704‑355‑5877). We are actively collaborating with faculty at UNC Charlotte on various projects. We are utilizing industry standard software and also developing new software to improve data analysis. Please visit website for fee schedule and procedure for sample submission at Carolinas Medical Center.

Major equipment and software:

  • The LTQ Orbitrap XL ETD is the only ETD instrument with both high resolution and accurate mass, enabling definitive protein characterization. Thermo Scientific ETD technology enables highly sensitive post-translational modification analyses. Combined with the LTQ Orbitrap XL, ETD completes the most advanced proteomics platform available by offering three complementary fragmentation techniques in one instrument: CID, HCD and ETD for definitive protein/peptide characterization, post-translational modification (PTM) analysis (especially phosphorylation); and top-down or middle-down sequencing of proteins and peptides.
  • TSQ Quantum Ultra is triple quadruple mass spectrometer which brings reproducible quantification of the target molecules.
  • LTQ XL Linear Quadruple 2-D Ion Trap Mass Spectrometer system that include high performance with Xcalibur and Bioworks 3.3 Software.
  • Eksigent nano 2-D Liquid Chromatograpy system with external 10-port column switching valve, configured for 20 ul/min max flow in first dimension and 1 uL/ min max.
  • SCAFFOLD and PEAKS are installed for the spectral count analysis and de-novo peptide sequencing, respectively.
  • Data will be transferred to all researchers at UNC Charlotte and CMC through Securetransfer FTP server.

Affymetrix Microarray Facility

The Affymetrix Microarray Facility is joint project by UNC Charlotte and Carolina Medical Center researchers located in the Molecular Biology Core Facilities in Cannon Research Center, CMC. This facility is managed by Dr. Nury Steuerwald at UNC Charlotte and the manager of the core facility, Z. Bahrani-Mostafavi, at CMC.

Major equipment:

  • Genechip Fluidics Station 400;
  • Genechip Hybridization Oven 640;
  • Affymetrix Genechip Scanner 3000;

The facility includes the latest software by affymetrix for data analysis and genomics study. The core facility laboratory is staffed by technicians who will prepare samples and provide data from the microarray system to researchers at both institutions.