End of year review

The end of the financial year here at the University has made me look back and review some of the things that have gone by. Firstly, from a financial point of view, everything has performed better than last year, the bio-imaging facility has increased its usage by 13% (and I thought we were almost at capacity last year - the MSc students showed us there was more mileage in that!), and the flow cytometry was up a staggering 26% (FACSCalibur) and over 80% (FACSAria). The Aria usage however may reflect the changed charging structure but certainly its usage has increased due to a couple of clinical trials coming on board.

March saw us have a successful grant application to the Yorkshire Cancer Research for a new analyser for the flow cytometry facility. We have currently finished the tender process and will be demo-ing machines in the next couple of months. How exciting!! Lets hope we can then put flow on main campus and really spark researcher's imaginations as to the potential of this fabulous technology. We also have a application in for a new confocal too which we won't hear about before March next year, so fingers are crossed for that!

We've had issues of course. Both the confocals and the FACSCalibur have suffered with reliability issues, the Calibur has had an ongoing pressure problem which BD have addressed on a number of occasions. I would think that internally the Calibur is a spring chicken compared to its 12 year old exterior! The old lady needs good care. And we have had issues with the computers and scan heads on the 510's but they have been functional throughout with a couple of workarounds! These things come to try us but you guys (our users) have been amazingly patient and from my point of view I'm extremely appreciative of that.

So, onwards and upwards for the next 12 months. I'm still aiming to out perform the year that has just gone by and I hope we can develop a few ideas along the way and report another increase in the user base and maybe some new equipment to boot!! Additionally, I hope to maintain this blog further and to try and pass my musings on on a more regular basis! Keep checking in, I know you're out there..!