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  Signifies key events

•  May 10, 2012 A 50mW 405nm violet laser is installed on the LSR II flow cytometer. This is the first violet laser to be installed on an analytical flow cytometer on the campus!
• March 8-9, 2012 The 3rd annual Southeast Flow Cytometry Interest Group (SEFCIG) meeting is held in Mobile, Alabama. Mario Roderer, PhD, was keynote speaker of the event. The program for the 2-day event can be found on the organization's web site at http://sefcig.org/
• February 6, 2012 The Cancer Center director declined to fund the facility’s laser upgrades :(. The request will be directed to alternate funding sources and if those do not prove to be fruitful, the request will be resubmitted to the center for the next fiscal year’s budget.
• January 27- February 13, 2012 An annual online flow cytometry core facility survey is posted.
  

• January 20, 2012 IDEAS ImageStream^x analysis software is upgraded from v4 to v5.

• January 12, 2012 The LSR II's single 24" flat-screen monitor is replaced with twin Viewsonic 22" light-emitting diode (LED) monitors. This newest generation of monitors have 5x the response time of the monitor that they replace, are environmentally friendly mercury free and are Energy Star 5.0 certified (40% energy savings compared to traditional monitors.) For perspective, the 24" LCD monitor that was originally installed on the LSR II at the time of its purchase carried a retail price of >$2,000, weighs almost 29lbs (vs. 10.4lbs for the Viewsonic) and has a contrast ratio of 500:1 (vs. 10,000,000:1).
  

• January 11, 2012 On-site demo of the facility's automated call counter, the Nexcelom Cellometer Auto T4, is given by the Nexcelom applications specialist, Rebekah Harden.
  

• January 3, 2012 After > 10 weeks waiting to obtain a quote to add a violet laser to the FACSCanto - with no success - interest in possessing one is withdrawn.
  

• December 21, 2011 A quote is received from Becton Dickinson to add a 100m W 561nm yellow laser, a 100mW 640nm red laser and 2 additional optical detectors to the LSR II and it is submitted to Cancer Center administration the same day as it was received for approval. Detailed documentation justifying the requirement for the system upgrade is also submitted. When installed, the LSR II will become a 4-laser, 10-color flow cytometer and capable of detecting 13 parameters for every particle (cell) detected!
  

• December 1, 2011 An automated cell counter is installed, which is aNexcelom Cellometer Auto T4. The Cellometer uses disposable counting chambers and performs Trypan Blue viability with on-screen imaging, is capable of measuring both individual and mean cell sizes and it can generate size distribution histograms for all counted cells. The software has the ability to adjust the minimum and maximum cell size parameters for heterogeneous samples and can recognize and count irregularly-shaped cells by adjusting the roundness cell setting.
  

• November 4, 2011 The FACSCanto's primary computer hard drive is replaced with a solid-state drive (SSD). Unlike traditional electromechanical computer hard drives that have spinning disks and movable read/write heads, SSDs use microchips and contain no moving parts, consequently, SSDs are silent and have lower access time and latency.
  

• November 3, 2011 The Windows computer analysis workstation is upgraded from Windows XP to the 64-bit version of Windows 7. Office 2007 is upgraded to 2010 and Photoshop and Illustrator are both upgraded from CS4 to CS5. The upgrade to the 64-bit version of Windows 7 maximized the potential of the 64-bit architecture of this computer, which effectively doubles the speed of the computer. A further advantage is that the operating software is now able to recognize all of the 4GB RAM that the computer is equipped with.
  

• November 3, 2011 The second Macintosh computer analysis workstation, a twin dual-core 2GHz Power Mac G5, is decommissioned. The computer is pre-Intel Macintosh, which is unable to support the latest versions of Photoshop, Illustrator or Office for Mac. The removal of this computer from the lab means that CellQuest Pro software is no longer supported in the core for data file analysis (CellQuest Pro requires Rosetta ( a dynamic binary translator), which is not supported in current Apple operating software).It is interesting to know that when the Power Mac G5 model of computers originally debuted in 2004, it was hailed as the first 64-bit PC and touted by Apple as the fastest personal computer ever built.
  

• October 26, 2011 The Laboratory License to Current protocols in Cytometry is renewed for a 2nd year.
• October 24-?, 2011 A quote is requested from Becton Dickinson to add a violet laser to the FACSCanto and a yellow laser to the LSR II.
  

• October 14, 2011 The LSR II's primary computer hard drive is replaced with a solid-state drive (SSD). Unlike traditional electromechanical computer hard drives that have spinning disks and movable read/write heads, SSDs use microchips and contain no moving parts, consequently, SSDs are silent and have lower access time and latency.
• September 14. 2011 Another LCD monitor is added to the 2nd Macintosh computer analysis workstation, which doubles the monitor "real estate" on the computer, which is helpful for multitasking software applications.
• August 8, 2011 ModFit LT software is upgraded to version 3.3. ModFit LT is powerful software used for ploidy-based call-cycle including samples with perturbed populations, proliferation analysis using cell-tracking dyes such as CFSE and custom least-squares analysis. 
• July 26, 2011 The primary Macintosh computer analysis workstation is upgraded to the latest Macintosh operating system, which is OS X Lion (10.7). Apple states that there are over 250 new or changed features in Lion.
  
• June 23-24, 2011 The 2nd annual Southeast Flow Cytometry Interest Group (SEFCIG) meeting is held in Athens, GA.
  The dates were purposefully selected as they correspond to the famous annual music festival in Athens, AthFest.
  Howard Shapiro, author of "Practical Flow Cytometry' is keynote speaker of the event. Detailed program information at http://www.georgiacenter.uga.edu/sites/default/files/sefcig-program_0.pdf and http://www.georgiacenter.uga.edu/sites/default/files/sefcig-core-managers-meeting.pdf.
• June 22, 2011 Darin Fogg, from Amnis Coporation, gives a seminar entitled "High Speed, High Content Image Analysis of Cells in Flow."
• June 6, 2011 The primary Macintosh computer analysis workstation is upgraded to  the latest Macintosh operating system, OS X Snow Leopard (10.6) in consideration of installation of a new 27'' LED Apple Cinema Display and an updated video card with 1GB RAM is installed to accommodate the new-style Apple mini DisplayPort, which the new monitor also requires. Snow Leopard is intended to be a release aimed to refine the existing feature set. Many of the changes involve how the system works in the background and are not intended to be seen by the user.
• June 2, 2011 FlowJo v10 Beta is installed. Users are encouraged to take it for a test drive! Beta-tester feedback to FlowJo is required.
• March 15-30, 2011 On-site demo unit of Invitrogen/Molecular Probes' automated cell counter, the Countess, is available in the facility.
• March 15, 2011 Invitrogen/Molecular Probes gives 3 flow cytometry-based talks: Introduction to Flow Cytometry: Basic Principles, what is Flow Cytometry and how does it work?, Novel Flow Cytometry Reagents from Life Technologies and Acoustic Flow Cytometry: Introducing the Attune Flow Cytometer by Andria Doty-Field, Dave Chappell and Andria Doty-Field respectively. 
•  February 7, 2011 A 40 terabyte (TB) server is installed in which core user data files can be stored and accessed by  core facility users. (For size perspective, know that 1 TB = 1,024 GB and that the entire written holdings of the Library of Congress requires 10 terabytes)
• February 1, 2011 One of the 2 Xerox Phaser 8560n color laser printers bites the dust (error message says "counterfeit yellow ink") and it is replaced with a lovingly used HP CP3505n color laser printer.
• January 19, 2011 The primary Macintosh computer workstation is upgraded to OS X Leopard (10.5). This upgrade allows PhotoShop CS5, Illustrator CS5 and Office for Mac 2011 to also be installed. According to Apple, Leopard contains over 300 changes and enhancements over its predecessor, OSX Tiger (10.4).
• October 26, 2010 A Laboratory License to Current Protocols in Cytometry is obtained.
• September 23, 2010 All Becton Dickinson digital flow cytometers are upgraded to Diva software v6.1.3.
• September 14, 2010 The LSRII’s outdated computer is replaced with the identical model as is found on the other Diva-software based cytometers in the facility.
• August 26, 2010 One of the 2 Ricoh Aficio CL2000N color laser printers is replaced with a Xerox Phaser 8560N color laser printer. Sayonara Ricoh CL2000N!
•  August 23, 2010 A 2nd Macintosh computer analysis workstation is installed, which is a twin dual-core 2GHz Power Mac G5 running OS X Leopard (10.5).The computer is equipped with CellQuest Pro v5 2.1, Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator CS3 and Office for Mac 2008 software.
• July 19, 2010 ModFit LT 3.2 for Windows is installed on the LSRII’s computer.
•  June 24, 2010 A 4-laser Amnis ImageStream^X imaging flow cytometer is installed, the first of its kind in Georgia! The system includes a stand-alone computer workstation running Windows XP for off-line image file analysis. The 4 lasers are blue, red and violet and yellow. The yellow laser represents a key wavelength for a flow cytometer as no other bench top cytometer on the campus is equipped with a yellow laser.
• June 8, 2010 FlowJo analysis software is upgraded from v8 to v9 on the Macintosh computer analysis workstation.
• June 3-4, 2010  The 1st annual Southeast Flow Cytometry Interest Group (SEFCIG) meeting is held in Athens, GA, on the University of Georgia campus. Albert Donnenberg of University of Pittsburgh Medical Center is keynote speaker of the event. More Information.
• June 3, 2010 FlowJo software seminar given by Dr. John Quinn, applications scientist from TreeStar.
• May 21, 2010 Two redundant cytometers, a FACSCalibur and the FACSAria, are traded in for a credit towards service on the LSRII and the residuals of the service contracts are transferred to other instruments in the facility.
• February 1, 2010 The chargeback system was updated to make it more reflective of acutal operating costs and which also acknowledge the pricing structure of the medical school's flow cytometry core facility.
• November 12, 2009 Windows is no longer supported on the computer analysis workstation.
•  November 2, 2009 A 3-laser, 8-color Becton Dickinson LSRII is installed. The 3 lasers are blue, red and UV. The UV laser represents a key wavelength as there is no other source of UV lasing on a benchtop cytometer on the campus!
• September 4, 2009 A special optical filter set was obtained that enables users to distinguish between concurrently expressing cells containng eGFP and eYFP fluorescent proteins, which have very close emission spectrums.
• July 24, 2009 The FACSAria IIu is placed inside a Baker BioPROtect III class II clean air and containment hood, which serves as a secondary containment for potentially dangerous aerosol formation whenever the FACSAria IIu is in operation.
• March 23, 2009 A National Institute of Health (NIH) Shared Instrument Grant (SIG) was submitted requesting funding for the Amnis ImageStream^X imaging flow cytometer. If funded, it will be the only instrument of its kind in the state of Georgia!
• March 1, 2009 A chargeback system was initiated with fees starting at a nominal $10/hour.
• February 26, 2009 A flow cytometry seminar series is initiated. Jeff Hudson from Amnis Corporation gives a seminar about the unique capabilities of his company's imaging flow cytometer, the ImageStream, which provides investigators with the visual power of microscopy and the statistical rigor of flow cytometry in a single platform.
• February 20, 2009 One of the 2 Ricoh Aficio CL3500N color laser printers is replaced with a Xerox Phaser 8560N color laser printer. Sayonara Ricoh CL3500N!
• February 19, 2009  The facility website is launched.
•  January 7, 2009 Electronic scheduling is initiated.
•  December 18, 2008 FlowJo v8 software is installed on the Macintosh computer analysis workstation.
• December 5, 2008 ModFit LT 3.2 analysis software is transferred from the Windows partition to OSX Tiger (10.4) on the Macintosh computer analysis workstation, which alleviates the need to restart the computer in the Windows partition to be able to access ModFit. ModFit is a powerful software used for ploidy-based call-cycle including samples with perturbed  populations, proliferation analysis using cell-tracking dyes such as CFSE and custom least-squares analysis and it was originally developed on the Macintosh platform.
• November, 2008 All digital flow cytometers are upgraded to Diva v6.1.1.
• November 4, 2008 All computers and printers in the lab are placed onto the network.
•  October 14, 2008 The 9-color FACSAria is upgraded to a FACSAria II.
• October, 2008 Office for Mac 2008, Photoshop CS3 and Summit v4.3 are installed on the Macintosh computer analysis workstation.
• October 7, 2008 William King, manager, is hired. Previously, William ran the flow cytometry core facility at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
• December 21, 2007 A 2nd Becton Dickinson FACSAria I cell sorter flow cytometer is installed inside a negative pressure suite. The instrument is equipped with 9-colors and 2 lasers (blue and red).
• December 21, 2006  A 64-bit twin 2GHz dual-core Intel Xeon Mac Pro running OSX Tiger (10.4) with a 20" Apple Cinema Display is installed. The computer is equipped with Windows XP,Microsoft Office for Windows, ModFit LT for Windows and CellQuest Pro v5.2.1 for data analysis.
• September 10, 2006 A 2nd Becton Dickinson FACSCalibur flow cytometer is installed.
• September 9, 2006 An 8-color, 2-laser Becton Dickinson FACSAria I cell sorter flow cytometer was installed. The lasers are blue and red.
• June 21, 2006 A Becton Dickinson FACSCalibur flow cytometer is installed.
• May 15, 2006 The Cancer Center flow cytometry core facility is effectively inaugurated with the installation of a 7-color, 2-laser Becton Dickinson FACSCanto I flow cytometer. The lasers are blue and red.
  
  

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