Biomolecular Resource Facility

The Biomolecular Resource Facility (BRF) consists of 4 laboratory units, all of which are located at the Bowman Gray Technical Center base. These include the Protein Analysis Core Laboratory, the DNA Synthesis Core Laboratory, the DNA Sequence Analysis Laboratory, and the BRF Computational Biology Resource. New (2003) equipment includes the Applied Biosystems model 3100 automated capillary DNA sequencer as well as the Linux server which hosts both linkage analysis software and the Wisconsin Sequence Analysis Package licensed from Accelrys. In addition, 2 new Bruker mass spectrometers, upgraded Waters HPLC and chromatography data systems for protein/peptide purification, and a new Proteomics server have been added to the Protein Analysis Core Lab (PACL). The Autoflex MALDI-TOF instrument is well-suited for automated protein identification as well as peptide mapping, and the Esquire HCT ion-trap mass spectrometer is equipped with an electrospray source with a capillary HPLC system. The Bruker Biotools and Matrix Science Mascot software run on a Dell PowerEdge 2600 dual processor server which functions as the Proteomics computational resource. The PACL also provides services for amino acid sequence analysis (Perkin Elmer/Applied Biosystems model 492 Procise sequencer) and custom peptide synthesis (Applied Biosystems model 430 synthesizer). The entire BRF operation is directed by Dr. Mark Lively, who also serves as the Director of the Molecular Genetics Program.