Digestive & Liver Disease Research Cores

Overview of Services

The Organoid and Cell Culture Core (OCCC) generates 2D and 3D in vitro models that can replicate the morphological features and functional complexity of broad epithelial tissues in health and diseases. The core offers a range of off-the-shelf frozen organoids and cell culture lines, as well as supplemental reagents, hands-on training and expertise to support and guide clients towards utilizing and/or incorporating organoid and cell culture-based model systems to advance their specific research objectives.

Products and services, broadly emcompass five categories: 3D organoid and 2D cell lines, reagents, quality assurance testing, equipment usage, and consultation and training. QA testing includes cell authentication and in-house mycoplasma testing. Equipment usage and basic training on Keyence imaging cytometer will be offered. Services such as hands-on training for 3D organoid generation from mouse and human tissue, from isolation to culture maintenance and passaging, as well as FFPE preparation for organoids are also offered. Finally, the OCCC offers personalized 3D organoid generation and establishment of fully annotated organoid line (out to passage 10).

The Bioinformatics and Single Cell Analysis Core (BSCAC) will play a central role in the Columbia University Digestive and Liver Disease Research  Center (CU-DLDRC), providing its members with access to GI/liver/pancreatic-focused state-of-the-art bioinformatics analysis and efficient workflows for horizontal integration with other CU-DLDRC core. Core services include standard computational analysis of scRNA-seq and scATAC-seq data (e.g. clustering, differential expression), more sophisticated workflows for regulatory network and trajectory inference, and analytical pipelines for more specialized techniques like PLATE-seq.

The Clinical Biospecimen and Research Core (CBRC) will provide a large number of stored biospecimens from the gastrointestinal tract and liver as well as assistance with biospecimen processing for the effective translation of laboratory findings into the clinical setting. The core provides skilled support in sample management including procurement, processing and storage; histological and single nuclueus RNA-seq analysis and data management. Thereby, it will provide assistance in transferring laboratory research concepts into clinical trials and development with the goal of accelerating research and trials. A particular focus on CBRC will be to link its biospecimens to services provided by the other CU-DLDRC cores. The CBRC seeks to achieve this mission through four clinical basic teams (CBT), providing structures to catalyze day-to-day collaboration between clinical and basic researchers in a traditional organ-focused manner.

The BioImaging Core (BIC) provides state-of-the-art and functional imaging techniques to precisely study mechanisms of health and disease of the digestive tract and liver. Besides a sophisticated suite of state-of-the-art microscopes, the small animal imaging unit will provide different platforms and customized protocols to functionally study signaling and metabolic pathways in all organs of the digested. 

Please cite our P30 grant in all your publications and presentations that were supported by our activities. We suggest using this language: “This research was supported by the Columbia University Digestive and Liver Disease Research Center (CU-DLDRC) grant 1P30DK132710.” If a center core was used, please specify the core by adding “and used the CU-DLDRC core...” Thank you!

Leadership

Location and hours of operation

Links and Resources

1. https://www.columbiadldrc.org/organoid-cell-culture-core/
2. https://www.columbiadldrc.org/single-cell-analysis-and-bioinformatics/
3. https://www.columbiadldrc.org/clinical-research-core/
4. https://www.columbiadldrc.org/bio-imaging/

Contacts