The Chemical Screening Center (CSC) is a shared research facility providing instrumentation and chemical collections that aid in the discovery of therapeutic agents and biomedical research tools. The UCSC-CSC provides a uniquely diverse collection of compounds derived from marine organisms, setting our facility apart as a leader in the discovery of therapeutic natural products. In addition, the UCSC-CSC has access to a diverse collection of known bioactives and tool compounds for drug repurposing studies, a 60,000-member library of synthetic, drug-like compounds, and a unique library of membrane-permeable cyclic peptides.  

The UCSC-CSC provides industry-level robotics for liquid and plate handling, allowing users to screen tens- to hundreds of thousands of wells in a single campaign. Our key analytical capabilities include an Opera Phenix high-content screening confocal fluorescence microscope, which enables the rapid, automated imaging of cells and organoids in multiwell plate format, and two fast, multimode Envision plate readers. The UCSC-CSC brings together expert chemists, bioinformaticians, and biologists engaged in disease research, and it is not unusual for our drug screens to involve a team of users spanning different disciplines.

Visit CSC website to learn more.