Last September, Cambridge, Mass.-based Bio-Rad Laboratories Microscience Division established a Grant Assistance Program to aid scientists like Stricker in their search for the money to buy one of these devices.
Stricker's research involves tracking calcium in cells. One way to do this, he explains, is to inject fluorescent, calcium-sensitive markers into living cells and then use imaging technology to create detailed pictures of the cell's calcium status.
The confocal system needed to obtain such pictures can't be found on the New Mexico campus in Albuquerque, where Stricker is an associate professor of biology. For the time being, Stricker and colleagues must make arrangements to use the state's only such instrument, at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, about 75 miles north of the university.
The University of New Mexico scientists would like to have a confocal system a little closer to home. The instrument is expensive, however, costing between $110,000 and ...
