New grants from the The Swedish Research Council will allow SciLifeLab platforms and units to double screening capacity, acquire high-end instruments and conduct large scale clinical trials. In this Q&A we check in with platform directors to get an idea of what is coming.
SciLifeLab platforms and units have as part of the call Grant for investment in existing research infrastructure received 151 million SEK from The Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet) – Sweden’s largest governmental research funding body, that “supports research of the highest quality within all scientific fields”. As a comparison, the core funding of SciLifeLab’s entire national research infrastructure was 217 million SEK in 2021. So, how will the platforms and units use this, quite substantial, sum of money? We asked the three SciLifeLab-related applicants that received the highest grants to tell us about their hopes and aims with the new funding.
Cryo-EM
Linda Sandblad, Platform Scientific Director at the Umeå node of the Cryo-EM SciLifeLab Infrastructure Unit, applied for the grant to expand the screening resources, and will receive 22,5 million SEK.
How did you feel when you found out that you got this grant?
I was super happy, since this application is the result of excellent collaborations and long-term facility establishment and strategic planning. The user group at Umeå University is growing, WCMM group leader Lars-Anders Carlson, SciLifeLab cryo-EM fellow Jonas Barandun and I, have worked together with the facility to enable higher cryo-EM data collection capacity and more opportunities for PhD student and postdoc training at the cryo-EM instruments. Since around a year back, we have together applied for grants to fund the microscopes
and detectors needed. As a result, we are extremely thankful that not only VR but also SciLifeLab, Umeå University and the Kempe Foundations support us in the development of the Cryo-EM facility.
We celebrated with lunch and cake in the garden together with the Cryo-EM users earlier this summer!
What do you plan to do with the funds?
The funds will be used for new cryo-EM instruments, we are just about to purchase a new 200 kV cryo-TEM for the Umeå node, which will serve as a national screening instrument. This is an important step for the extended National Cryo-EM Screening Network we have launched during 2021. At the same time both cryo-EM nodes, Umeå and Stockholm, will upgrade detectors and software at our current 300 kV Titan Krios instruments to improve image recording speed and facilitate applications such as single particle and tomography. Part of the funds will also be used to enable micro crystal electron diffraction (MicroED) at both nodes.
How will this change/upgrade the national services?
During the last 5 years the Cryo-EM unit has delivered access to cryo-EM data collection to the Swedish research community, it has become very popular, produced very cool results and beautiful molecular structures. More and more PhD students and postdocs like to learn cryo-EM, to prepare samples, plunge freeze and screen for a perfect cryo-EM grid suitable for high resolution data collection. Screening takes time and requires both facility support and access to a dedicated cryo-EM microscope with an autoloader. We have good access to high
end data collection, but screening has been a bottleneck. With the National Cryo-EM Screening Network, screening will be possible at several universities, closer to the user groups. In Umeå we will with this grant be able to double our cryo-EM capacity for both screening and data collection. It will give more opportunities for local students and postdocs to be involved, hands on, with cryo-EM operation and data collection.
This Cryo-EM facility upgrade package also includes upgrades of detectors to improve image acquisition speed and facilitate applications such as single particle, tomography and micro crystal electron diffraction (microED) at both nodes. The new detectors are important for ongoing technology development projects; we are currently pushing MicroED data acquisition methods and workflow establishment for correlative fluorescence and cryo electron tomography forward. Many users are already involved in the technology development, which is closely tied to their research questions, and it will hopefully lead to new skills and facility routines. We believe cryo-EM imaging is valuable for further chemistry and cell biology projects.
What does this mean for your unit?
Directly we can more than double the cryo-EM data collection capacity for 2022. To receive a big grant also has an impact on additional levels: It is a great motivation for both facility users and staff to know that we have the possibility to work at the cutting edge of technology. It is fun to be an attractive facility and to offer the users the best possible infrastructure to be internationally competitive with their research. It is inspiring to see new students and postdocs approaching their dreams, to learn new methods and have the possibility to work with very cool instruments!
Spatial and Single Cell Biology
Mats Nilsson, Platform Director of the Spatial and Single Cell Biology platform, applied for the grant to acquire new instruments, and will receive 29 million SEK.
How did you feel when you found out that you got this grant?
I was very happy that VR recognized the importance of spatially resolved molecular profiling, a technology area where there currently is a very rapid development. This enables completely new means to study the cellular and molecular diversity of for example tissues from organs of mammalian organisms, including humans.
What do you plan to do with the funds?
We will acquire cutting edge instruments for the Spatial and Single Cell Biology platform at SciLifeLab. One high end imaging mass spectrometer will be acquired by the Spatial Mass Spectrometry unit in Uppsala. The Spatial Proteomic, Spatial Transcriptomic and In Situ Sequencing units in Stockholm will acquire automated equipment for high-throughput molecular profiling to their respective units.
How will this change/upgrade the national services?
This investment will both add new capabilities to these spatial omics units, as well as increasing their throughput in order to serve more users faster.
What does this mean for your units?
With these additions to the technologies and instruments that we are already offering, we will stay at the absolute fore-front internationally.
BioMS
Johan Malmström, Platform Scientific Director at the Structural Proteomics unit and Lund University Node Manager at Swedish National Infrastructure for Biological Mass Spectrometry (BioMS), aimed to create a harmonized cross-node instrument park and will receive 41 million SEK – something that will contribute to a significant increase in SciLifeLab’s clinical proteomics capacity.
How did you feel when you found out that you got this grant?
We felt very excited about the opportunity to further extend BioMS services and to continue the transition of proteomics into an integrated part of translational research and prospective clinical trials.
What do you plan to do with the funds?
BioMS is a VR funded national infrastructure in biological mass spectrometry with a strong focus on providing cutting edge instrumentation and research support to Swedish researchers. The new funds will be used to establish mirrored translational instrument platforms, methods and QC-procedures in University of Gothenburg, Karolinska Institutet and Lund University.
How will this change/upgrade the national services?
The instrument platforms will be the start of a harmonized cross-node instrument park that will, along with the new methods and QC-procedures, allow researchers to conduct national large scale multi-site clinical trials using the latest MS technologies. Such capabilities will be important technology resources for Precision Medicine and Pandemic Laboratory Preparedness and further support the ongoing collaborations between BioMS, SciLifeLab, and the Swedish research community.
What does this mean for your BioMS nodes?
The mirrored instrument platforms will drastically increase the sample throughput, quality and robustness, which will be a transformative change for BioMS. We are excited about the prospect to for the first-time support truly cross-node large scale translational and clinical projects. In addition, the activities will further strengthen the strong collaborative spirit within BioMS. This will further catalyze the improvement of methods, support and dissemination of expertise to connect proteome biomarker studies with prospective biomarker driven clinical trials.