SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE For the Helios, a CyTOF® System (Brand Name or Equal) The Rogers VA Medical Center located at 200 Springs Road, Bedford MA 01730 requires the following brand name or equal Helios, a CyTOF® System. This notice is not a request for competitive proposals, however; any responsible source who believes it is capable of meeting the requirement may submit a capability statement to the contracting office no later than Wednesday, July 5th at 12:00 Noon, EST. Interest/capability statements may be sent to Linda Buccigrossi, Contracting Officer, at
[email protected] and should include company name, address, and point of contact, business size, socio- economic status; and product information. No telephone responses will be accepted. This notice is to assist the Government in determining sources only. A solicitation is not currently available. If a solicitation is issued, all interested parties must respond to that solicitation announcement separately from the responses to this announcement. ***When submitting responses via email, please be sure to type Mass Cytometer in the subject line*** DESCRIPTION OF REQUIREMENT Scope of Work The requirement is for a Mass Cytometer for analytical detection technology that shall be capable of identifying biological markers of disease and used to design, develop, implement, test and provide assays for said biomarkers for the detection, diagnostic evaluation and monitoring of central nervous system disorders such as Alzheimer disease (AD) and related neurodegenerative disorders. The Mass Cytometer shall have capability of simultaneously resolving more than 30 markers on a per-cell basis at high acquisition rates, thereby providing researchers with an unparalleled ability to phenotypically and functionally profile cells from normal and diseased states. The probe shall not use conventional fluorescence-based cytometry technology that is less desirable for high sensitivity and specificity. The Mass Cytometer shall employ element-tagged probes and resolve isotopes of different masses with minimal signal overlap over an extended mass range. The elements may include but are not limited to rare earth elemental tags which provide similar signal intensities to one another, and are not naturally found in biological samples, thereby avoiding measurement of background non-specific signal. The Mass Cytometer shall provide data on samples generated from frozen post mortem brains of Alzheimer s disease patients as well as other specimen preparations. The detection of non-targeted and targeted markers in these samples shall provide detailed information on quantity of products of interest. The Mass Cytometer shall provide a combination of time-of-flight mass spectrometry with metal-labeling technology to enable comprehensive functional profiling applications. Cellular targets shall be labeled with metal-tagged antibodies and detected and quantified by time-of-flight mass spectrometry. The high purity and choice of metal isotopes ensure minimal background noise from signal overlap or endogenous cellular components. The requirement/commodity shall enable investigators to discover cellular proteins and to validate the changes associated with different disease status. It shall be sufficient to accurately identify biological markers related to disease state and progression in humans. The Mass Cytometer shall have streamlined workflows and multimodal capabilities for cellular exploration. It shall be able to explore system-level biology at single-cell resolution on an accessible, expandable platform. The Mass Cytometer shall provide over 100 detection channels and the ability to measure more than 30 markers per cell, and shall profile the phenotype and function of all cells in a system simultaneously. The Mass Cytometer shall have large number of channels to enable larger panels and more flexible panel design. It shall have increased sensitivity to improve detection of low-abundance targets, with a user friendly interface that simplifies and streamlines data acquisition. It shall provide fast sample acquisition rates to reduce data collection time and automated system calibration to maintain the system s peak performance. The Mass Cytometer shall provide analysis platform that provides an array of analysis tools. The contractor providing the Mass Cytometer shall also maintain and make available validated products to calibrate the Mass Cytometer utilization of such validated products, the requirement/commodity shall enable identification and validation of novel biomarkers in biological samples such as blood and brain tissue, etc., which can potentially serve as a tool for exploring diagnostic and prognostic markers for Alzheimer s and other neurodegenerative diseases. The contractor will provide a 2-day mass cytometer operation and maintenance refresher visit to enable higher dimensional experiments and new research projects, including dedicated time for operators. Mass cytometer 101 training is a prerequisite. The contractor will provide a 3-day intensive overview of the Fluidigm mass cytometer for 2 participants. The course includes hands-on experience and mastery of the mass cytometer operation and maintenance. This training will include necessary Fluidigm reagents The contractor will provide on-site installation of the CyTOF. The contractor will provide 1 year parts, labor, and travel; 1 year software upgrades, tier 1 on-site preventative maintenance visit per year of coverage, 1 on-site application visit , detector coverage included; also includes 1 consumable kits per year