bgong

The UC Davis NeuroMab facility (http://www.neuromab.org) has been established by NINDS and NIMH to generate and distribute high-quality validated mouse monoclonal antibodies against neuromolecular targets (NeuroMabs) to neuroscientists on a non-profit basis. NeuroMabs are excellent reagents for protein localization studies in adult, developing and pathological brain; biochemical analyses of subunit composition and post-translational modifications of native brain proteins; and proteomic analyses of endogenous brain protein networks. As of July 2005, the NeuroMab facility has 5 years of funding to make NeuroMabs for 250-500 neuronal proteins. In collaboration with Antibodies, Inc., NeuroMabs are produced on a large scale and made available to the neuroscience research community as tissue culture supernatants, ascites fluid and purified immunoglobulins. The current catalog contains NeuroMabs against ~70 brain targets, with initial targets emphasizing membrane receptors / channels / transporters; membrane-associated scaffolds; synaptic proteins; other neuronal signaling molecules; and disease-associated proteins. The NeuroMab facility welcomes suggestions from neuroscience researchers for future targets. Requestors should make these proposals via the website and supply: - a scientific justification as to the biological importance of the target molecule; - the importance of such a NeuroMab to the research community; - a summary of the availability / suitability of existing antibodies to said target; and - a list of reagents (antigenic fusion proteins or synthetic peptides, full-length cDNAs or stable cell lines, KO mouse samples) that can be made available for the development and characterization of new NeuroMabs. The NeuroMab advisory board, together with NINDS and NIMH program officials, will prioritize all requests for inclusion into the queue based on these informational portfolios. The facility is also interested in validating and distributing existing brain specific monoclonal antibodies made by other labs. Neuroscientists willing to contribute their monoclonal antibodies to the NeuroMab catalog should contact the facility director.