The NAPPA Protein Microarray Core was created in the Virginia G. Piper Center for Personalized Diagnostics in the fall of 2013, capitalizing on over a decade of experience with Nucleic Acid Programmable Arrays and high throughput automation of DNA handling and purification, array production, and array screening.

Our NAPPA Protein Microarray Core offers four basic services:

Printed NAPPA arrays customized with the genes of interest per the user requirements.
Printed NAPPA arrays followed by array processing and screening for a varied number of queries per user requirements
Printed NAPPA arrays with screening followed by bioinformatics analysis of the data per user requirements.
High throughput DNA purification
Each of these services follows detailed SOPs with revision controls in place, as well as a pre-determined GMP process flow once the order is entered into a custom-built database that tracks protein microarray production and usage, called NAPPA Tracking.

This process begins with an order request entered into the NAPPA Tracking database by the user with advice from the Core Manager. This leads to a series of activities executed by specialized service teams that can include using our Nexus ASRS to automatically retrieve the relevant genes for the the study, employing our automated DNA Factory to grow and purify the DNA, printing the arrays, testing the quality of the array printing and protein display, probing the arrays with the experimental samples, automated data collection of the arrays, and detailed biostatistical and bioinformatics analysis. QC checks are performed at critical process steps to ensure quality product is created, and finally, the order (or data) is (are) shipped to the customer with the included QC certificate(s) and proper SOPs as needed. All plates of clones, DNA, samples as well as all microarrays are barcoded with unique ID numbers that are confirmed by associated robotics. The Core also tracks all internal inventory items to maintain adequate supplies to ensure all orders can be fulfilled quickly.