Oct 28 2008
Applied Biosystems Inc. today announced the worldwide availability of a new universal genotyping reagent solution that accelerates the generation of high-quality genotyping data for a host of life science applications. The TaqMan® Sample-to-SNP(TM) Kit enables scientists who conduct genetic disease investigations, cancer research, transgenic animal studies, plant research, and agricultural seed selection to prepare a wide variety of biological samples for real-time PCR in minutes and generate accurate genotypes for those samples in less than one hour.
The TaqMan® Sample-to-SNP™ Kit provides researchers with a sample preparation protocol that significantly advances the way they conduct their genotyping experiments by enabling them to rapidly perform studies that analyze genetic variations such as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Through the development of this new kit, Applied Biosystems has eliminated the need for scientists to create unique processing procedures – such as DNA purification – for different sample types, which is typically time-consuming, ranging from a few hours to several days, depending upon the experiment.
At the University of Texas at Austin, for instance, researchers are accelerating SNP genotyping workflows by using the new TaqMan Sample-to-SNP Kit in breeding experiments to identify rare recombinant plants. They are studying how genetic variation in the model angiosperm, Arabidopsis thaliana, allows some plants to escape, avoid, or tolerate drought stress. A better understanding of how plants have solved this problem in nature will help the researchers in their efforts to develop better crops through breeding and genetic engineering. They have found that the reagents can convert leaf samples to genotypes without the need for separate DNA purification procedures. They also only need a small amount of leaf sample and a minimal number of assays to rapidly generate genotypes for a large number of plant samples.
“With the TaqMan Sample-to-SNP Kit, we can use a smaller amount of leaf tissue for our experiments, greatly reducing the time needed to get high-quality SNP genotyping data, and making it possible for us to harvest plants earlier,” said Tom Juenger, Ph.D., an associate professor in the university’s Section of Integrative Biology. “By using these new reagents, we can avoid costly DNA purification procedures allowing us to grow greater numbers of plants in each generation, while significantly reducing the possibility of cross-sample contamination.”
The TaqMan Sample-to-SNP Kit consists of two primary components: the sample-preparation component, namely DNA Extract All Lysis Reagents, which consist of chemical lysis, and DNA-stabilization reagents; and the fast genotyping component, which is the TaqMan® GTXpressTM Master Mix. This kit enables researchers to release DNA from biological samples that include blood, cells, buccal swabs, mouse tails, plant leaves, seeds, or formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tissues, often used to archive cancerous tissue specimens. PCR reactions for genotyping analysis can be performed with one of Applied Biosystems’ real-time PCR, or fast real-time PCR systems.
“By introducing the fastest, most versatile set of TaqMan genotyping reagents we’ve ever developed, Applied Biosystems continues to strengthen its growing portfolio of genotyping solutions,” said Peter Dansky, president for Applied Biosystems’ functional analysis division. “Providing researchers with a single reagent kit, which can generate high-quality data from almost any biological sample within an hour, will simplify and accelerate genotyping projects that range from disease research to agricultural applications.”
Applied Biosystems offers one of the life-science industry’s most comprehensive lines of genotyping and RNA expression analysis solutions that include individual TaqMan assays and arrays of assays for microRNA analysis, along with a complete line of TaqMan® Array gene signature panels. With over 4.5 million TaqMan® SNP Genotyping Assays, TaqMan DME Genotyping Assays, 1 million TaqMan® Gene Expression Assays, custom assays, and industry-leading reagents and instruments, Applied Biosystems is a leading provider of fast, simple and effective genotyping and gene expression tools.
For more information about the TaqMan Sample-to-SNP Kit see http://info.appliedbiosystems.com/sample2snp.