Bench to bedside for cancer

Five Melbourne-based cancer research organisations have come together to form a new integrated cancer research facility, based at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute at Parkville.

WEHI is joined by the Ludwig Institute, the Royal Women’s Hospital, the Royal Melbourne Hospital and the University of Melbourne in the $5 million facility.

Established with a $5 million grant from the Australian Cancer Research Foundation, the new ACRF Centre for Therapeutic Target Discovery (CTTD) aims to share human and material resources to further cancer research, predominantly in bowel, breast and blood cancers.

The money will be used to purchase new equipment, including:

• A mouse RNA interference library

• A Cell Sorter and Cell Analyser from BD for flow cytometry

• A live cell imaging microscope from Zeiss and a deep cell imaging microscope from Olympus

• A Bond-maX Cell Stainer and a fresh tissue embedder from Leica for molecular pathology, along with a Veritas automated tissue laser

• A Xenogen IVIS Spectrum animal imager and a BD Pathway 855 system for imaging

• An Eppendorf Automatic Dispensing System, a BMG Labtech FLUOstar microplate reader and Applied Biosystems thermal cyclers for systems biology.