Facility Location and Staff
Preclinical Core
UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center
1600 Divisadero St., Hellman Bldg., San Francisco, CA 94115
415.476.0419 (voice)
Box 0808, San Francisco, CA 94143-0808
Contacts
Rosemary J. Akhurst, PhD, Director, 415.514.0215
Byron Hann, MD, PhD, Manager, 415.476.0419
Don Hom, PhD, Technician, 415.476.1204
Donghui Wang, Technician, 415.476.1204
Staff
Dr. Rosemary Akhurst undertook her doctoral thesis studies at the Beatson Institute for Cancer Research in Glasgow, UK, followed by post doctoral training at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, USA. She has run her own laboratory for around twenty years and has as many years experience studying the cellular and molecular mechanisms of tumorigenesis in mouse models. For the last two years her laboratory has had a research agreement with Eli Lilly to investigate novel targeted therapies in mouse models.
Dr. Hann received his training from the UCSF School of Medicine and the UCSF Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics. This was followed by a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Dundee, Scotland. He has over ten years experience in the study of the molecular basis of human cancer, and has worked on mouse models of human cancer for the past six years. Since July 2004, he has been managing the UCSF Breast SPORE preclinical core, the UCSF U54 preclinical core and most recently the UCSF Preclinical Therapeutics Core as a Developing Core at the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Dr. Hom has extensive experience in animal based research. Having worked for over 12 years at UCSF, he spearheaded development of surgery-based procedures directed at orthotopic tumor xenografting. Dr Hom has a strong background in mouse survival surgeries such as ovariectomy, orchiectomy, mammary fat pad clearing and transplantation, and renal capsule grafting; as well as drug administration techniques such as intraperitoneal injections, intradermal injections, tail vein injections and oral gavage.
Ms. Wang has extensive experience in the implementation of preclinical studies, including cell culture, tumor implantation, drug administration, tumor measurement and animal monitoring, and survival surgery. She has been a member of the UCSF Breast SPORE for over five years, and has played a central role in the completion of over 200 preclinical studies. She is an expert in small animal survival surgeries, and a master of techniques such as intracardiac cell implantation. She is also very familiar with the routine procedures, particularly for subcutaneous xenograft based studies.
Facility
Laboratory
The laboratory consists of approximately 1,500 sq. ft. of space in the Cancer Research Building at the Mt. Zion Campus. It includes wet lab bench space for four investigators including PCR units, agarose and acrylamide gel electrophoresis equipment, a refrigerated microcentrifuge, 4°C and -20°C storage refrigerators/freezers, and three computers for lab personnel; two tissue culture rooms equipped with CO2-incubators, hoods, microscope, tabletop centrifuge and 37° water baths; a liquid N2 and -80°C storage unit; and a fluorescence stereo microscope (contained within the barrier facility). The laboratory is one floor above the Cancer Center Rodent Barrier Facility.
Animal
Mice used in these studies are housed in a state-of-the-art specific-pathogen free rodent barrier facility located in the basement of the Cancer Research Building, one floor below the laboratory. This animal facility houses 8000 cages and is staffed by ten personnel from the Laboratory for Animal Resource Center. A cesium irradiator and a Xenogen in vivo imaging system and associated PC are located within the barrier and accessible to all investigators to irradiate or image cells and whole animals. The Cancer Center rodent barrier follows strict barrier protocols to minimize viral outbreaks.
Other
The PCTC maintains a cryorepository of cancer cell lines optimized for passage in immune-deficient mice. Core personnel are responsible for all aspects of the in vivo study including animal ordering, estrogen pellet implantation, cell culture, tumor cell implantation, tumor volume measurements, drug administration, and collection of tissues as required and data analyses. The PCTC maintains a database on cancer cell lines with published and unpublished data concerning molecular and cellular phenotypes of interest to research scientists. A Committee on Animal Research (CAR)-approved protocol is used for all projects, with modifications approved by CAR. An ongoing activity within the Core has been the in vivo selection of human breast and other cancer cell lines from primary tumors. These cells are available to all investigators. The Core maintains a bank of formalin-fixed, paraffin embedded tissue blocks and a bank of frozen tissue in liquid nitrogen from breast cancer cell line xenografts, as well as xenografts from human primary breast and other cancers which have grown as xenografts. Training is provided to postdoctoral fellows and technicians who wish to enhance their skills in experimental procedures on small laboratory animals.
