Lab Resources

Facilities

Laboratory Space:

The Soft Tissue Biomechanics Laboratory (STBL, PI: Vande Geest) is approximately 1300 square feet and is located in the Center for Biotechnology at the University of Pittsburgh. This room contains two chemical fume hoods, four large wet lab bench areas, a tissue sectioning bench, and personal computing stations.
On the same floor and directly adjacent to the above space, the STBL also holds a separate 400 square foot room specifically designated for cell and tissue culture. This room houses the equipment listed below under cell and tissue culture.
The multiphoton microscopy laboratory is located in the same building (Center for Biotechnology) on the second floor in a room that has been upgraded to house this advanced microscope. This space is approximately 500 square feet and is blacked out for microscopy. This room has greater than 3 bar pressure as well as appropriate emergency power and vibration levels. Temperature variation in this room is less than 2 degrees Celsius per day.

Animal:

The University Animal Care facility maintains and manages IACUC approved animal facilities. Programs of animal husbandry, preventive medicine, pre- and post-surgical care have been developed to assure adequate veterinary care is provided at all times. Complete veterinary, diagnostic, and clinical support services are available.

Personal Computers:

The STBL has 11 personal computers, each with 3Ghz processors, a 500GB hard drive, and 2G memory. There are also four instrument computers in the STBL. These computers run software for digital image processing, the biaxial devices, a small angle light scattering device, and the uniaxial tensile testing device. All computers will be made available to perform the research proposed in this proposal.

Image Processing Computer:

The STBL has a 40 core 2 node image processing PC with 500Gb of RAM and 1TB of hard drive space for use as an image processing and computational simulation resource.