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NMR Facility History
The UTHSCSA biomolecular NMR facility was founded in 2001 through an NIH
Instrumentation Grant for the purchase of a four-channel 600 MHz NMR spectrometer.
This grant funding helped to leverage additional funding from the UTHSCSA
Children Cancer Research Institute, the UTHSCSA Permanent Univerisity Fund,
and the Houston Foundation, which enabled the acquistion of 500 and 700 MHz
four-channel NMR spectrometers to complement the 600 MHz spectrometer.
The installation of the 500, 600, and 700 MHz instruments began in the Summer
of 2001 and was completed in the Spring of 2003. The instruments have been
fully operational since this time and are housed in two adjacent laboratories
on the fifth floor of the UTHSCSA Allied Health Science Building on the Medical
Center North Campus. The electrical power to the spectrometers was initially
supplied by a 12 kVA Controlled Power single conversion UPS, although this
later was found to have a switching delay that under some circumstances was too long.
This UPS was subsequently retired and replaced with a 12 kVA double conversion
Powerware unit in the Summer of 2003, which has functioned flawlessly since then.
The initial setup of the facility was carried out by Dr. Andrew Hinck, a
faculty member within the Biochemistry Department at UTHSCSA. Dr. Hinck
currently serves as the Director of the facility, although he has been
assisted since early 2003 by Udayar Ilangovan, a former postdoctoral
fellow at UCLA. Dr. Ilangovan currently oversees maintenance of the three
instruments, as well as user training and maintenance of the pulse program libraries.
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