LMU User Policy

Access

All users are welcome to use LMU instruments. To gain access you must participate to a training session for new users after which a user account will be created for you and you will have an access to the reservation system. Contact LMU ( e-mail: lmu-staff at helsinki dot fi, phone 191 58872 or 191 59730 ) to get a time for training. It is highly recommended to make an appointment before training to discuss the specifics of your project so that we can tailor the training according to your needs. For example if you do not have previous experience with confocals the training is typically two 2-hour sessions depending on your samples. User training is charged according to the duration of session multiplied by the number of participants. The access for the 5C corridor door can be added to your magnetic key after the first training session.

Reservations

Reservations for the light microscopy unit equipment are done through a web based application at http://lmu.biocenter.helsinki.fi/ The reservations are made in one hour blocks.

Reservation system can be accessed from outside of the University of Helsinki with either authenticated proxy or HY-VPN services if you have an email account at the university.

Important to know before booking:

• Booking of the equipment before use is compulsory.
• Cancellations should be done 1h before a reservation starts.
• Workdays 9-17 are Prime Time and other times are Out of Prime Time. If your reservation spans Prime Time and Out of Prime Time, please divide it to two blocks.
• Reservation time limits; longer reservations by separate agreement:
• SP5: 5 hours/day and 10 hours/week prime time
• SP2, SP5 HCA, MP SP5 SMD and LSM 700: 6h/day
• 3I Marianas: 10h/week prime time
• 3D Workstation: 14h/day
• Other Workstations: no limit
• Cell-IQs, CellInsight: no limit
• Reservations can be made 21 days in advance except for Cell-IQs 30 days. If you need to reserve further in advance, contact us.
• We charge the full amount for every starting hour.
• During a reservation there is a possibility to cancel next hours by End Session Now button. It is also possible to extend a session if there are no conflicting reservations. Reservations can be modified by only the person who has made them or an administrator.
• Accumulated bills will be sent out four times per year.
• All LMU computers make a security log. The log files will be occasionally checked. All extra usage that has not been told to us within two working days will be charged 100% extra. You can notify us by reserving more time from the scheduling system (notice that there is a modification limit of 1 hour) or by sending us an email (lmu-staff at Helsinki dot fi).

Try to make reservations so that prime time is used efficiently. When you make a reservation on the confocal microscopes write down the laser lines you will be using to the description field. This is important information in order to let the previous user know which lasers can be shut down to extend their life time. On applicable systems use the option drop down menu to select the temperature for your reservation. The reservation system will show reservations with 37C or 37C+CO2 -options in red on the calendar view. If you want to make your experiment at 37C, do not leave the option field as None. 37C option is right one for experiments made at 30-40C, just add the exact temperature you want to the Description field. If you want to make your experiment at room temperatures use the RT-option. If the temperature does not matter to you, use the None-option. Note that it takes time to cool down or warm up the microscope and you should always leave enough time between reservations for this. If there are conflicts between the temperatures on the reservations they will be solved on first come first served principle.

Times needed to heat up and cool down the microscopes:

Microscope	Heating	Cooling
SP2, SP5 HCA, SP5MP, 3I	2h	2h
SP5	2h	1h

Important at the end of session

• Check from the reservation system what the next user is doing before finishing a session. If the next user comes within two hours leave the system and lasers the next user is using on and log off from the computer. Otherwise shut down the system. If the lasers have been left turned on unnecessarily, you will be charged for the time. At an analysis workstation leave it on if there is usage at the same day.
• If the next user within 24 hours has a 37C reservation leave/turn on the heating, otherwise leave the system at room temperature.

LMU staff will make an effort to have the systems on the right temperature but the final responsibility is on the previous user to leave the system on right temperature. If you are planning to do use 37C at time when there has been no use within the last 24 hours (for example on Monday morning), you have to make sure yourself that microscope will be warmed up before your session.

Scope of Services

LMU staff provides basic training and troubleshooting during prime time at no extra cost. More advanced services like imaging your samples or analyzing your images can be done either as scientific collaboration or fee for service. On scientific collaboration we charge the used equipment time and on fee for service the equipment time + operator cost. On large projects the fees are negotiable.

Acknowledgements

The LMU personnel would greatly appreciate, if Light Microscopy Unit was mentioned in the acknowledgements in research publications containing imaging data acquired in or with support of LMU. Here is an example of a sentence that can be used: “Imaging was performed at the Light Microscopy Unit, Institute of Biotechnology.”

We kindly ask to send a notification about your LMU-supported publication to the head of the imaging facility: Kimmo dot tanhuanpaa at Helsinki dot fi