GCAT's History

4 Academic Years

2000 Undergraduates

800 Microarrays

3 Countries

1998

• Hear Pat Brown (Stanford) talk at ASCB meeting.
• Each chip "costs $5 to produce."
• Sitting next to Mary Lee Ledbetter and we agree that $5 sounds affordable.
• I contact Pat and ask him for chips.

1999

• First batch of 135 yeast chips from Pat Brown and Barbara Dunn (Stanford).
• 23 brave faculty sign up for bold new adventure.
• Mel George (Univ. MO/ PKAL) writes a personal check for $50 so I can open GCAT checking account.
• Genisphere agrees to give GCAT members discounted pricing on 3DNA reagents.
• Establish GCAT-L listserv.

2000

• Students and faculty begin experiments.
• I go on sabbatical with Lee Hood (ISB) as host.
• I attend CUR meeting, hear about MUE grants, meet Laura Hoopes (Pomona).
• Silicon Genetics gives GCAT members GeneSpring software for free.
• I scan chips on borrowed scanners and realize the need for core facility.
• Laura Hoopes, Todd Eckdahl (MWSC), Laurie Heyer (Davidson) and I write MUE grant that purchases chip reader.
• Pat Brown and David Botstein declare GCAT official collaborators and post student results on SMD.

2001

• 34 Faculty sign up for second year of GCAT.
• Students present results at various meetings.
• Faculty submit grants to NSF and NIH.
• Lee Hood and Krassen Dimitrov (Institute for Systems Biology) donate 200 yeast chips.
• Ellen Wisman (Michigan State University) donates 12 Arabidopsis chips.
• Tim Durfee and Fred Blattner (University of Wisconsin-Madison) donate 20 E. coli chips.
• Richard Bookman (University of Miami School of Medicine) donates 30 partial human and 20 mouse chips.
• Mark Salata (Gordon College) begins formal assessment.

2002

• 41 faculty sign up for third year.
• Students present results at various meetings.
• Faculty submit grants to NSF and NIH.
• Lee Hood and Krassen Dimitrov (Institute for Systems Biology) donate 200 yeast chips.
• Ellen Wisman (Michigan State University) closes her lab, no more Arabidopsis chips.
• Tim Durfee and Fred Blattner (University of Wisconsin-Madison) donate 40 E. coli chips.
• Richard Bookman (University of Miami School of Medicine) promises partial human and mouse chips but has technical problems in production.
• Davidson College funds the purchase of mini-DNA microarrayer.
• GCAT submits NSF proposal to fund two summers of workshops.
• Launch CSU system-wide pilot program with state funding.
• Launch halophylic bacterium chip project at Northern Arizona University
• Kathy Takayama (University of New South Wales, Australia) launches DoGCAT pilot studies.

2003

• Laurie Heyer's team (Davidson College) develops MAGIC Tool free microarray software.
• Initiate collaboration with Cathy Wheeler at Hiram College to develop Microbiology Identification Chip.
• Added Fly and Maize to list of species for microarrays.
• Jerry Honts (Drake University) to develop proteomic teaching modules.
• Mike Boyle (Juniata College) offers protein chip scanning service.
• Betsey Dyer and Mark LeBlanc (Wheaton College) propose bioinformatics collaboration with GCAT.
• Dick Shand (Northern Arizona University) receives NSF-CCLI to purchase microarray scanner.
• Laura Hoopes receives NSF MRI grant to purchase microarray scanner.
• GCAT has outgrown supplier's capacity to share chips.
• Submit Center of Excellence grant with Jef Boeke at Johns Hopkins to produce barcode microarrays
• Submit HHMI consortium proposal to fund GCAT under current model.
• Submit NSF grant for second workshop.
• Several GCAT members explore NSF supplementary grants to fund next year's chips.
• Fatigue setting in for trying to fund GCAT
• NSF-sponsored Best Pactices Workshop at ISB

2004

• Second NSF-Funded Microarray Workshop (July 2004)
• Submit proposal for Springboard to NIH Roadmap
• BAMBED article describing GCAT
• CBE manuscript describing GCAT
• Develop spotted Bar Code microarrays in collaboration with Jef Boeke at JHU
• Developing bacterial ribosomal indentification microarrays