We want to introduce you to Prof Simon Barry, member of Phenomics Australia’s Scientific Director’s team and Head of the Functional Genomics South Australia (FGSA) at the University of Adelaide.
Meet Simon:
Professor Simon Barry is a molecular biologist interested in immunological defects that give rise to autoimmune diseases such as type 1 diabetes. He has a collaborative research program in the discipline of Paediatrics, which has both a basic science and a translational component. This allows him to undertake gene discovery and functional validation in vitro and then access human clinical material to determine whether there is a causal link with disease.
Simon completed his PhD at the National Institute for Medical Research in London. Following his postdoctoral appointments, Simon moved to the University of Adelaide to start his own laboratory. He has joined Phenomics Australia to perform high throughput screening.
Through the Victorian Centre for Functional Genomics (VCFG) at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, the Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research (Perkins), the ANU Centre for Therapeutic Discovery (ACTD, The John Curtin School of Medical Research, ANU) the Monash Functional Genomics Platform (MFGP) at Monash University, and the Functional Genomics South Australia (FGSA) at the University of Adelaide (in partnership with SAHMRI), Phenomics Australia Functional Genomics and High-throughput screening services enable biomedical researchers Australia-wide with the ability to perform novel discovery-based screens using multiple platforms.
The facilities are staffed by experts and offer a range of access opportunities, from enabling researchers to be embedded in the facility and to be trained on appropriate equipment and fully supported by the team from assay concept design, screening and analysis, through to full fee-for-service screening capacity. Through this collaborative approach, the Researcher always maintains control of their data through frequent discussion with the facility team.
By housing extensive liquid handling automation, high content imaging capabilities and sophisticated plate reader instruments, the scale of a screen is entirely up to the researcher. All sites house an arrayed whole genome human synthetic CRISPR library and have access through the VCFG to arrayed and pooled viral library screening resources. The ACTD and VCFG also house whole human genome siRNA SMARTpool arrayed libraries for RNAi screening. The VCFG also houses human miRNA, long non-coding RNA and shRNA screening libraries and a mouse whole genome RNAi library. Through Compounds Australia, who house Australia’s largest compound repository at Griffith University, all sites are able to offer compound screens at any scale.
More information available on Phenomics Australia Resources page.
