New Editor-in-Chief at Immunology and Cell Biology

Using animal models to study traumatic brain injury

Doing more with less: Improving flow cytometry staining

Our latest paper isn't going to cure cancer. But it may just making research into curing cancer 10-fold cheaper. A major cost for immunology, oncology and haematology labs is antibodies, especially with the fancy (and expensive!) new dyes coming on the market, which let us hit the 40-50 parameter range in flow cytometry. Fortunately, Dr Oliver Burton in our lab has developed a simple and easy approach to reduce those costs by 10-fold, while also improving the quality of the data: shifting to overnight staining. You can read the full paper here, describing the protocol, fixatives and optimisation approaches, but essentially, lower antibody concentrations give less background, and if left overnight to stain are able to give even better signal detection. It is also a game-changer for wet-lab staff: rather than having all day dissections and staining, and then cueing for flow cytometer hours in the evening, you can set everything up, put on the staining and get an early night. Next morning your cells are ready to go! 

Out now at Current Protocols!

Update on Thursday, November 17, 2022 at 4:54PM by Adrian Liston

We have had multiple requests for a detailed staining protocol, so here it is!

Congratulations to Dr Ana Acosta!

Well done to Dr Ana Acosta, who successfully defended her PhD today! Ana tackled a challenging and exciting project on the role of HNF1A in monogenic diabetes, generating a new mouse model and validating results in primary human islets. Her work dramatically alters the way we see HNF1A in glucose homeostasis and diabetes. A very productive PhD, performed at University of Lille, with Prof Caroline Bonner, and the University of Leuven, with my team. The 20th PhD student to graduate from my lab, and one of the last from our Leuven days! Great job Dr Acosta!