Leading-edge facilities for biotechnogy research
Our research is supported by state-of-the-art labs and specialised instrumentation so that our our students can be involved in innovative biotechnology projects.
Macquarie University has a strong reputation for research excellence. Some of our areas of research include:
Meet some of our early and mid-career researchers as they explain the focus of their research projects.
Facilities
Macquarie University has world-class research facilities on-site, offering our students and researchers training and access to state-of-the-art technologies and equipment.
This experience advances our graduates ahead of the crowd, ready to meet the challenges of real-world industries in the international biotechnology sector.
The Australian Proteome Analysis Facility (APAF) is located within the Faculty of Science and Engineering at Macquarie University. APAF provides our researchers, and corporate clients, with advanced functional proteomics and protein chemistry tools integrated with in-house and commercial bioinformatics toolkits.
APAF strives to answer the most challenging research questions in the life sciences, medical, agriculture, food and biotech sectors by pushing the limits of technological innovation, ensuring that our researchers continue to have access to the latest generation of advanced technologies, and thereby retain global leadership across their respective fields.
Macquarie University is home to the Australian Genome Foundry, a high throughput biofoundry which enables us to design, build and test thousands of strains per week, to understand and unlock nature’s potential.
We use the power of synthetic biology and laboratory automation to explore large biological solution spaces. We partner with:
- academics to address fundamental biological questions
- industry partners to engineer superior industrial microbes and proteins.
The Macquarie University NMR Facility includes:
- the Bruker AVIIIHD 400 and 500 MHz, and AVII 600 MHz NMR Spectrometers
- Australia’s first parahydrogen generator.
BCUII chiller units facilitate low temperature experiments, and have demonstrated unparalleled performance thanks to the exacting specifications of our new nitrogen generation system.
This significant investment in Macquarie University’s infrastructure is allowing users to routinely access temperatures down to 200K (-70C) without the use of liquid nitrogen, enabling such experiments to be carried out far more quickly and safely than at any other institution in Australia.
Our state-of-the-art zebrafish facility is located within an aquatic physical containment 2 (PC2) laboratory inside the larger PC2 laboratory of the Macquarie University Centre for Motor Neuron Disease Research.
The facility has been specifically designed to facilitate all aspects of zebrafish work and includes:
- microinjection facilities
- microscope facilities
- behavioural tracking facilities
- zebrafish breeding
- training services
- zebrafish agistment
- cryogenic freezing.
The facility houses and breeds genetically modified transgenic, mutant and wild-type strains of zebrafish in an Aquatic PC2 space.
The three microinjection stations allow for the generation of transient, stable, knockdown or knockout zebrafish models.
The microscope facilities offer access to a range of microscopes; from phenotyping microscopes up to high end confocal and live imaging microscopes.
The Faculty of Science and Engineering Microscopy Unit has an outstanding suite of advanced electron and optical instruments with associated specimen preparation equipment.
Microscopy staff provide appropriate training, support and expertise to researchers and students, offering a rare and valuable opportunity for analysis, and experience for future research endeavours.
Macquarie University’s Environmental Quality Laboratory is used primarily for the structural and elemental analysis of soils, sediments, rocks, artefacts and other materials.
The Lab also hosts:
- three Hach spectrophotometers
- soil hydraulics equipment (UMS Ksat, Darcy boxes)
- a range of other equipment for materials analysis.
Major analytical capabilities include:
- X-ray diffractometry (XRD)
- X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (XRF)
- Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS).