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microarray centre financial support
In November 2000, the UHN established with financial support from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (CFI), the Clinical Genomics Centre (CGC) as part of the Genes, Proteins and People program. This centre was established around three core competencies, microarrays, structural proteomics and gene profiling.
These three groups continue to operate as a cohesive core offering a broad spectrum of solutions to researchers in Toronto, Canada and around the World.
In November 2007, the CFI through it’s Leading Edge Initiative renewed investment in the CGC to allow for the expansion of these core competencies. Specifically, these new CFI funds allow the CGC to:
- Increase throughput and flexibility of the technology platforms to address increasing demand, also resulting in more timely and cost-efficient service, and thus wider accessibility.
- Enhance capacity for storing, integrating, and mining the clinical, genomic, and proteomic datasets.
- Develop novel technologies which expedite disease gene discovery and link large genomics datasets to biological/clinical outcomes.
- Develop new tools and reagents for linking genetic data to the development of clinically-useful diagnostics and therapeutic tools.
In January 2007, the Ontario Research Fund’s Research Excellence Program awarded a grant to the UHN Microarray Centre for the development of next generation genomic and proteomics tools. This current project builds directly on the previous success of the ORDCF funded project by adding increased manufacturing capacity to further drive down the costs of microarray based technologies. The proposal also aims to develop much needed but currently nascent protein array technologies that can be provided either through the UHNMAC infrastructure or through a potential commercial partner such as a spin-off of the UHNMAC. Currently there are no clear leaders in the field of protein-based array technologies, and the UHNMAC is well positioned to become a world leader in this sector - as we are for DNA-based arrays.