The Blackburn group is housed within the Institute of Infectious Disease & Molecular Medicine, UCT, in BSL1 and BSL2 laboratories that are well equipped for research & training.
Our state-of-the-art facilities include:
- High performance mass spectrometry (Thermo Q Exactive quadrupole-orbitrap MS and Thermo TSQ Vantage triple quadrupole MS; plus local access to Agilent 6530 qTOF MS and AB4800 MALDI-TOF/TOF MS)
- Nano-LC (Dionex NCS-3500RSnano UPLC and Proxeon Easy nLC)
- Bioinformatic analysis of data, including cluster-based data storage and processing
- Surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy
- UV/VIS and fluorescence spectroscopy
- Noble metal nanoparticle synthesis
- Gene cloning & mutagenesis
- Library creation and in vitro selection of biomolecules (including aptamers) based on function
- Protein expression in bacterial and and insect cell cultures
- Protein purification and enzymology
- Laminar flow hoods and incubators for tissue culture
- In addition, the group has access via the Centre for Proteomic & Genomic Research and other local labs to:
- Custom protein microarraying (Genetix QArray2)
- Automated microarray hybridisation (Tecan HS 4800) and microarray scanning (Tecan LS ReLoaded)
- Bead array-based assays (BioRad Bioplex system)
- High throughput genomics, including Affymetrix DNA microarrays( Affymetrix GS3000 and GeneTitan systems), high density qPCR & next generation sequencing (MiSeq & IonTorrent)
- Confocal fluorescence microscopy
- Flow cytometry and mass cytometry
- Biosafety level 3 laboratories