RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 A tale of two cores: a quantitative comparative analysis of the institutional and the open access models for flow research technology platforms
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press
DO 10.1101/138552
A1 Petrunkina, Anna
A1 Schulte, Reiner
YR 2017
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/05/17/138552.abstract
AB Biomedical specialist core facilities are major part of institutional infrastructure in academia and play important role in research by creating access to well established and emerging technologies and being a source of valuable expertise. In each particular case, the extent, range and content of services they provide are determined by the technology specialism, demands of the users and institutional/overarching policies. In 2012, two flow cytometry core facilities embarked on a new journey in development of their services to research community in Cambridge. Both facilities started from the same initial level: mainly providing services in flow cytometry and cell sorting, each equipped with two sorters, staffed with two laboratory personnel and headed by a manager. While both cores provided the services in cell sorting, their approach to service provision, operations, access and funding model differed. In this brief case study we apply a mathematical formalism suggested by Petrunkina and Filby (2017) for utilization and efficiency metrics of sorting service in context of two different service provision models: institutional (IM) and centralised (CM) and discuss further avenues of facilities development.