FOCUS ON Biological Electron Microscope Facility

Established: 1984 by the Pacific Biomedical Research Center (PBRC)

Equipment: A full line of instrumentation for conventional transmission (cross-section) and field emission scanning (3-dimension/surface) electron microscopy as well as a complete line of instruments for cryoelectron micro-scopy. Most recent acquisition is a half-million-dollar energy filtering transmission electron microscope funded by the Department of Defense with matching funds from University Research Council and PBRC.

Staff: Director Richard D. Allen, Manager Marilyn F. Dunlap and Supervisor Tina M. Weatherby Carvalho. Together they have more than 90 years of experience in electron microscopy.

Services: Equipment is available for an hourly fee. Clients can be trained to use the equipment or contract for limited staff services. During the past five years, BEMF has served faculty and researchers from more than 50 laboratories in PBRC and UH Manoa's Cancer Research Center of Hawai`i; Colleges of Natural Sciences, Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources and Engineering; and the Schools of Medicine and Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, as well as visiting investigators from mainland and foreign institutions.

Research: BEMF supports basic cell, reproductive biology and neurobiological studies and research specific to the Pacific region, including investigations in aquaculture, botany, zoology, marine biology and oceanography, tropical agriculture, infectious disease and natural products chemistry. The facility also serves researchers of systematics, conservation and evolutionary biology from UHM, Bishop Museum and other organizations.

Funding: The annual operating budget of $130,000 is paid for by user fees, PBRC funding and grants from the Research Centers in Minorities Institutions, National Center for Research Resources Program of the National Institutes of Health. Most instrumentation has been obtained with funding from the National Science Foundation biological instrumentation program, federal research grants and University matching funds.

Mission: Although BEMF's primary goal is to support faculty research, the facility participates in the education of students through demonstrations to undergraduate and graduate classes, workshops in electron microscopical techniques and support for the research of undergraduate and graduate students and postdoctoral associates.

Web site: www.pbrc.hawaii.edu/bemf

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