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Core Facilities

The University of Massachusetts promotes discovery, supports the economy and makes its world-class research facilities and staff available to partners in industry and government.

Core Research Facilities

The University of Massachusetts has more than 90 core research facilities across the state that are available to researchers from government, academia and industry on a fee-for-service basis. These shared resources offer a wide range of services to the research community, including cutting-edge technologies, high-end instrumentation and technical support for basic, translational and clinical research.

The capabilities available at each facility are as unique as the researchers found at each location. Our expertise ranges from life sciences to material sciences, nanofabrication to biomanufacturing, robotics to mechanical prototyping, chemistry to high-performance computing, and more.

Core Facilities Voucher Program

For small and medium-sized businesses, a new state voucher program provides access to world-leading research facilities at UMass campuses at significantly discounted rates.

The voucher program is designed to accelerate business development for start-ups and small- and medium-sized companies. With state incentives, start-ups can develop prototypes and test new devices at a much lower cost. Similarly, established companies, especially manufacturers, can create prototypes to bid on contracts without having to make large investments beforehand. To learn more about the state voucher program, use our voucher contact form to contact one of our campuses.

Eligibility:

  • Start-ups and companies with 10 or fewer employees receive a 75% subsidy.
  • Start-ups and companies with 11-50 employees receive a 50% subsidy.
  • Start-ups and companies with over 50 FTEs are not eligible for this program.

Peter Reinhart

5-Campus Voucher Point Person, Director, IALS
E Email phr@umass.edu

Andrew Vinard

UMass Amherst, Director, Core Facilities
E Email avinard@umass.edu

Bill Brah

UMass Boston, Venture Development Center
E Email william.brah@umb.edu

Catherine A. Palmer

UMass Dartmouth, Office of Research Administration
E Email cpalmer1@umassd.edu

Karen Hamlin

UMass Lowell, Director, Core Research Facilities
E Email karen_hamlin@uml.edu

Susanna Perkins

UMass Medical, Director, Research Cores & Operations
E Email susanna.perkins@umassmed.edu

Core Facilities on UMass Campuses

UMass Amherst

In 2016, UMass Amherst opened the Institute for Applied Life Sciences, with 30 core facilities dedicated to the development of new drugs, drug deliveries and health-monitoring products. The state-of-the-art facilities and equipment include metal 3D printing, roll-to-roll fabrication, inductively coupled plasma mass spec, analytical ultracentrifugation, X-ray diffractometry, super-resolution microscopy, whole-room calorimetry, infrared motion analysis, sleep and behavioral observation labs, and a 3 Tesla human MRI/S.

UMass Boston

UMass Boston research core facilities currently include Vivarium and Genomics Cores. Our program will be soon extending to include: Imaging, Mass Spectroscopy, Fabrication, Flow Cytometry, and Infrared/Raman Spectroscopy. With easy access from the north and south shores of Massachusetts, UMass Boston is close to city incubators, universities and Fortune 500 companies. Our researchers specialize in biomedical, health, life and brain sciences.

UMass Dartmouth

UMass Dartmouth offers instrumentations within our Environmental Chemistry, Biomanufacturing and Mechanical Prototyping Lab at the Center for Innovation & Entrepreneurship. Our Chemistry and Biochemistry Departments offer a multitude of sophisticated analytical and biomolecular instruments. We are in the process of reviewing our research centers to broaden our core offerings.

UMass Lowell

Since inception in 2013, nearly 800 researchers have used our fee‐for‐service facilities. UMass Lowell research core facilities program, branded as Core Research Facilities (CRF), was created with users in mind. We have a simple stream‐lined process to provide quick and easy access to labs. Our professional staff provides hands‐on training and services. We have an integrated on‐line reservation system that includes a searchable database of resources. State‐of‐the art instruments and resources are available to academic, government and industry researchers. We support research in the fields of bioengineering, biomaterials, chemistry, green chemistry, material sciences, nanotech and nanofabrication, radiation sciences, robotics and much more.

UMass Medical School

UMass Medical School spearheaded the core research model supported by NIH and NSF. UMMS offers 45 facilities including the second largest Sequencing facility in New England, are host to the Northeast PacBio Hub, and are one of 5 Centers across the country for Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping. Our new highly publicized cores include the Massachusetts Center for High Resolution Electron Cryo Microscopy.

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