Large instruments and core facilities - ISS (EN)

Responsible: Dr. Marco Crescenzi - Curriculum Vitae
telephone: (+39) 06 4990 3163
mail: direzione.fast@iss.it

Activities

The mission of the ISS Technical Instrumentation and Core Facilities Service is to carry out the following activities:

• · support for the strategic management of the assets of the Italian National Institutes of Health;
• · design and developmentment of instrumentation and new technologies;
• · rationalization of the use of high-cost technologies with transversal possibilities of use within the Institute

The Service also carries out research activities within its sphere of competence.

The structure promotes a continuous improvement of the professionalism and technological capabilities of the Italian National Institute of Health, contributing to maintaining and increasing its competitiveness in advanced biomedical research and the function of scientific reference for the country. The multidisciplinary skills present in the structure favor the pursuit of excellent research activities, sustainable independently or collaboratively, and the provision of technologically advanced services.

These services are presented to external specialist users through the following website: https://corefacilities.iss.it (link to the Italian website)

Technical-Scientific Areas

The Service is divided informally into the following 8 areas:

Scientific calculation

"High Performance Computing" (HPC): development and implementation of high degree of parallelism algorithms. Design, development and management of methods, tools and systems for the treatment of data flows generated by scientific equipment in biomedicine and, in general, by digital archives and sources. Implementation on architectures: multicore, multi CPU, multi GPU. Machine learning applications and libraries, artificial intelligence and Bayesian networks.

[Read more... link to the Italian website]

Contact person: Dr. Irene Ruspantini
+39 06 4990 3098

Cell Factory FaBioCell

FaBioCell is a cell factory, i.e. a pharmaceutical workshop authorized for the production of drugs for cellular therapies which, together with gene therapy drugs and tissue engineering products, make up the Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products or ATMP family. FaBioCell was born with the aim of promoting the process of transferring the results of research conducted in the field of tumor immunotherapy to the clinic, not only in the ISS but in collaboration with other research centers and clinical centers, taking into account the strong and growing attention to the promising prospects of clinical use of the new personalized cellular drugs.

[Read more... link to the Italian website]

Qualified person: dr. Luciano Castiello
+39 06 4990 6080

Cytometry

The Core Facility performs cytometric flow, cytofluorimetric or mass-type analyses, at the single cell level. The Area is equipped with three analyzers that allow analysis of up to 10 fluorescence parameters, two cell sorters capable of separating up to four cell populations on the basis of 10 fluorescence parameters and a mass cytometer (CyTOF) which is capable of multiparametric analyzes between 25-35 parameters (up to a theoretical maximum of 90), based on the use of antibodies conjugated to rare metals. Flow cytometric analyses can be conducted in High-Throughput mode.

[Read more... link to the Italian website]

Contact person: dott. Massimo Sanchez
+39 06 4990 2576-2550

Electronic Paramagnetic Resonance (EPR)

The Electronic Paramagnetic Resonance (EPR) area is equipped with 4 continuous wave spectrometers in X band, one of which with very high sensitivity. EPR is applied, in vitro / ex vivo, to the study of free radicals, oxidative stress, antioxidants, protein structures, membranes, metalloproteins, radiation damage, including fields of pre-clinical research (degenerative diseases and tumors). The area also makes use of skills and techniques for the dosimetry of ionizing radiation (stimulated luminescence and other advanced detectors) and for the study of oxidative stress.

[Read more... link to the Italian website]

Contact person: Dott. Donatella Pietraforte
+39 06 4990 2907

Microscopy

The area is equipped with:

• a confocal laser scanning microscope for fluorescence studies of cell systems, intact organisms and biological tissues;
• a high resolution scanning electron microscope;
• a transmission electron microscope for ultrastructural analysis of biological systems;
• the instruments necessary for the preparation of the samples for scanning and transmission electron microscopy

[Read more... link to the Italian website]

Referrals:

Dr. Serena Cecchetti (Confocal Microscopy)
+39 06 4990 2966

Dr. Lucia Bertuccini (Electronic Microscopy)
+39 06 4990 2092

Dr. Mario Falchi (Live-Imaging Microscopy)
+39 06 4990 3667

Magnetic Resonance for MRI and High Resolution Spectroscopy

The area is equipped with:

• a 9.4 T spectrometer operating in high resolution for metabolism and metabolomics studies in cells, biological fluids and tissues (high resolution NMR units)
• an in vivo MRI system for imaging and spectroscopy for small animals operating at 4.7 T for morphological, molecular and functional imaging studies (MRI unit)

The area uses pre-clinical research skills in oncology, neuroscience, aging and metabolic diseases.

[Read more... link to the Italian website]

Contact person: Dr. Rossella Canese
+39 06 4990 2567-3695

Proteomics

The area consists of two units: mass spectrometry (MS) and reverse phase microarray (RPPA). Mass spectrometry is applicable to semi-purified proteins to identify and

characterize post-translational modifications and adducts, as well as to the qualitative and quantitative study of complex mixtures, sub-cellular and total proteomes, biomarker research and analysis of protein complexes. The unit also makes use of skills in the preparation of biological samples and bioinformatics analysis of the data. RPPA analysis studies the levels of signal transduction activity. Immunostaining, using more than 400 validated antibodies, allows for the automated semi-quantitative measurement of a large number of samples.

[Read more... link to the Italian website]

Contact person: Dr. Marta Ponzi
+39 06 4990 2868

Next Generation Sequencing (NGS)

PGMs (personal genome machines) are second generation sequencers (NGS), designed for small laboratories, which have a lower capacity than other sequencers but which have the same advantages of speed, accuracy and reduced costs. Our sequencing service features an Ion GeneStudio S5 which uses sequencing technology via a semiconductor CHIP.

[Read more... link to the Italian website]

Contact person: Manuela Marra
+39 06 4990 3051