Every Monday morning, Ulrich Baxa, Ph.D., and his colleagues enter their Gaithersburg, Md., laboratory and begin calibrating their Titan Krios, a massive, $7-million transmission electron microscope that can capture high-definition images at near-atomic magnification. They load several flash-frozen biological samples into the Krios and, by 5 p.m., program the instrument to collect data. As the team leaves for the evening, the Krios begins shooting beams of energy into the samples and taking photos.

Sitting at a computer in an NCI at Frederick laboratory, Todd Hartley writes an automated method for an experiment. With a final swipe of the mouse, he clicks an on-screen button that says “Run.” The large device sitting to his left, a Biomek FXP Laboratory Automation Workstation, whirrs to life. A robotic arm hovers over a deck containing various microplates then lowers a group of pipette tips to draw liquid from a reservoir, raises and moves again, and deposits the fluid in a nearby microplate with superhuman accuracy.

A team of scientists in NCI at Frederick’s Center for Cancer Research Mouse Cancer Genetics Program and their collaborators at the University of Florence have identified a link between the presence of a growth factor receptor and cognitive impairments in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease).

The future of the Frederick National Laboratory (FNL) and its large initiatives was at the forefront of the recent Frederick National Laboratory Advisory Committee (FNLAC) meeting held in Shady Grove. Here are a few excerpts, accompanied by time stamps from the videocast.

Employees crowded into the Building 549 auditorium as Norman E. Sharpless, M.D., took the podium at Shady Grove, addressing NCI and contractor employees watching live and via telecast viewings. “What a difference a year makes,” he began, reflecting on how he was sworn in on the same day exactly one year ago.