UC Davis Comprehensive Course in Flow Cytometry - ONLINE Workshop February 7-11, 2022

This comprehensive online flow cytometry course will teach you how flow cytometers work and how to design your assays to achieve reliable, reproducible results. After covering the basics, we’ll discuss advanced topics including multicolor panel design, troubleshooting, data analysis and artifact reduction. The concepts introduced in these lectures will be complemented by virtual laboratory sessions that will expand your knowledge of key concepts and best practices in analytic cytometry, cell sorting, experiment design and analysis. Your instructors are Bridget (director) and Jonathan (manager) of the UC Davis Flow Cytometry Shared Resource Laboratories who have over 35 years of combined experience in flow cytometry that provides the foundation of this excellent course! The lecture and laboratory modules will be conducted through teleconferencing software to bring you our time-tested training course to you safely and conveniently. The course includes daily interactive sessions, such as live data analysis, a live panel design workshop, interactive trivia and question/answer sessions to give students the best online experience and instructive time at the cytometers using live streaming videos. Lectures from our vendor partners will provide brief “bite-sized” discussions of topics curated by your instructors to familiarize you with the latest flow cytometry technologies. Thanks to many generous sponsors we are able to continue to offer this popular course and encourage you to join us this summer for another fun week of flow education!

Why should I attend?

Typically offered in person to a limited number of enrollees, recent feedback from our Feb. 2022 course highlights the success of our transition to online training: 

•Just seeing multiple ways to properly analyze the data has been valuable, since there are a few different routes one could take but still result in a correct analysis. Also, seeing where the instructors are drawing gates has given me more confidence in my own Flow skills that I am doing things correctly. :)

•Bridget and Jonathan are extremely knowledgeable and explained concepts in a way that was easy to understand. These training materials will be a great resource when the information in my brain fades after a little while. 

•Both Jonathan and Bridget are very effective in explaining details on hard to understand concepts. They are very knowledgeable and able to transfer than information effectively.

•Bridget and Jonathan are exceptional teachers and their knowledge and mastery of Flow is evident! Thank you for teaching this course and passing on your Flow wisdom.

•Both Bridget McLaughlin and Jonathan Van Dyke  were excellent, they offered a comprehensive discussion on multiple flow cytometry topics, shared important experimental tips and resources and were available every step of the way to help and encourage to learn.

•I appreciate that this course was offered all online. It would have been much more difficult and expensive to attend if it was in-person.

There is one option for attendance:

Full curriculum: Lecture plus afternoon laboratory sessions – limited to 50 participants 

The course objectives are:

·      Learn the fundamental concepts of how flow cytometers work

·      Explain the physical and electronic concepts in light collection and signal processing

·      Discuss best practices in sample preparation for flow cytometry

·      Describe standard assays and techniques

·      Demystify multicolor cell staining, compensation and analysis

Laboratory sessions include:

·      UC Davis LSRII: Software setup for successful multicolor acquisition and analysis

·      UC Davis Astrios Cell Sorter: Cell sorting fundamentals using the Beckman Coulter Astrios

·      Cytometer setup and quality control for consistent performance

·      Principles and Advantages of Spectral Cytometry using the Cytek Aurora

·      Interactive 3 hour Multicolor Panel Design workshop with BD Biosciences 

·      Daily data analysis sessions:  FlowJo basic and advanced flow cytometry data analysis

 

The daily schedule from the Feb 2022 course can be viewed here:  https://drive.google.com/file/d/1U2XEbUcB_YsIFlhNWbRol6nF-3_HmKDH/view?usp=sharing

Who should attend?

Prior course participants have included faculty, post-doctoral researchers, graduate students, staff, motivated high school students (!) and researchers from our industry partners.

What are the prerequisites?

Flow cytometry is now used across a broad spectrum of biological research programs. As such, there are no prerequisites other than familiarity with general biological concepts and a desire to learn about fluorescence, flow cytometry and cell sorting. Some general laboratory experience in working with live cells is helpful, particularly immunofluorescence microscopy and cell staining.

What do I need to bring? The course will be offered online to comply with the current campus restrictions that prohibit large gatherings to limit the spread of COVID-19 infection. All course materials will be provided electronically, and lecture materials as well as many of our guest and vendor partner presentations will be made available in a PDF format. It will be necessary to have a laptop or tablet to participate in the course and follow along with the lecture materials. We will be working with FlowJo software in the data analysis demonstrations (during lecture sessions) and in the FlowJo lab. FlowJo version 10 will work on either Mac or PC and you can download a free trial during the course to use if you wish at www.flowjo.com 

Can I provide my own samples? The laboratory sessions will use previously prepared samples geared toward specific teaching goals, so we won’t have time to work with individual samples during our virtual demonstrations. Please bring your questions, as the lab sessions are a great time to discuss the details and issues with your current or planned cytometry experiments.

Can I bring my own data? We will provide experimental data sets during the workshop to keep everyone on track and to illustrate important concepts. If you have specific questions, please bring them, or flow plots from your own analysis or an image file for us to look over and offer advice. During the latter part of the week we’ll cover multicolor panel design and will have an interactive group session to field “live” panel design requests from our students.

How much does it cost?

Registration fees include all lecture and laboratory materials. Lecture materials will be provided as PDF slides detailing key flow cytometry concepts in a format that begins with flow cytometry fundamentals and progresses to include advanced topics such as multicolor panel design, troubleshooting, artifact identification, and data analysis.

For the full lecture plus laboratory curriculum, the registration fees are as follows:

•UC Davis (and UC System) Faculty, Post-Docs, Students and Staff: $900.00

•Cancer Center Laboratory Members from U.S. NCI-Designated Cancer Centers: $950.00

•Other Non-UC Academic Institutions: $1,100.00

•For Profit Companies/Industry Partners/Biotechnology Firms: $1,495.00

Where is the course? The course is held ONLINE but your instructors will be on-site in their flow cytometry laboratory to bring you the best “virtual” experience in a professional environment.

Questions? 

If you have any questions, please contact Bridget at bmclaughlin@ucdavis.edu