Bioenergetics Phenotyping Core
University of Mississippi

Bioenergetics Phenotyping Core User Policy

The Bioenergetics Phenotypic Core (BPC) is a shared facility available to all students and researchers at UM, as well as, external users.

  • Please, acknowledge the NIH Award Number in any publication resulting from the use of the Seahorse Analyzer (NIH award no.: S10OD026751). This gets reported to NIH annually as productivity on this award and supports the acquisition of future instrumentation grants to the University. As an example, the Acknowledgments section may include the following text: “Work was supported in part by the National Institutes of Health (S10 OD026751), the University of Mississippi (UM), and the UM School of Pharmacy.”
  • All users are treated with equal respect, and all types of samples are given equal importance.
  • All new users must email Katie Heath and provide the required details such as user information, sample details, account number, etc. 
  •  To gain access to the Seahorse Analyzer, all users must have completed the Biosafety and Chemical Safety Training offered by UM Laboratory Services (https://safety.olemiss.edu/) and must be certified for the use of the analyzer by the Instrument Manager, Fakhri Mahdi.
  •  Please do not change the instrument settings and never attempt to fix any equipment problem/s. In case of any problem/s, please contact the BPC manager, Katie Heath (keheath@olemiss.edu) or Instrument Manager, Fakhri Mahdi (fmahdi@olemiss.edu) as soon as possible. 
  • Users are responsible for their own data. Data and images should be transferred from the computer to portable media promptly. 
  • Do not download/install/upload any programs of files onto BPC computers. Do not delete/remove any data or images from the BPC computers. 
  • Following each session, the lab should be vacated promptly to allow other users to use the facility. The lab and equipment should be clean, operational, and in the standard configuration. The time required for clean up after a user and the time needed to correct any problems due to changes made in the configuration by a user may be billed to the user. 
  • Repair and opportunity costs for damage to instruments by the users may be billed to the user/Principal Investigator. 
  • Normal operating business hours are Monday to Friday, 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM. Approval for after-hours use is restricted to experienced users who have demonstrated a high degree of proficiency and independence and are at the discretion of the staff. 
  • Infectious samples are not approved for use with this instrument. 
  • All users must follow standard lab safety protocols. No food or drink is allowed in the facility at any time.

    Reservation

    A reservation is required for Core services. Please contact the BPC manager, Katie Heath (keheath@olemiss.edu) to schedule a reservation.  Users can only reserve for their own use and not for someone else. Users who scheduled will be billed for the service used.

    Cancellation

    All cancellation requests must be made 24 hours in advance and must be canceled through email. Failure to cancel your reservation on time will result in being fully charged for the time reserved. 

    Training

    Training and certification are performed by the Instrument Manager, Fakhri Mahdi, MS. Users must follow all instructions of the staff.  Refresher training is required if users have not used the Seahorse for more than 12 months.

    Acknowledgments

    Investigators are required to recognize the role of the NIH Shared Instrumentation Grant in producing data for publication in the acknowledgment section of the manuscript. We ask that the authors submit a copy of the bibliographic reference or a PDF of the publication to the BPC manager (Katie Heath; keheath@olemiss.edu) for inclusion in the annual progress report.  

    Requested acknowledgment: “Work was supported in part by the National Institutes of Health (S10 OD026751), the University of Mississippi (UM), and the UM School of Pharmacy.”