Product news

Separating nucleic acids by size with subsequent isolation of specific fragments is a fundamental, but tedious, molecular biology technique. As second generation sequencing platforms gain utility, it has become clear that reproducible and scalable sizing and isolation has become a bottle neck for many applications of new sequencing technologies.  Caliper Life Sciences has developed and commercialized instruments that utilize microfluidics to achieve rapid and high resolution electrophoretic separations.  While we have focused most of our efforts on analysis applications (e.g. DNA, RNA and protein sizing), we have also previously demonstrated preparative applications, such as fractionation of nucleic acid for cloning.  We have now developed a commercial solution, the LabChip XT, that will simplify and improve nucleic acid fractionation.  By using intersecting microfluidic channels, optical detection and computer control, we can automatically extract a target band during separation and route the selected material to a collection well.  Using this process we have successfully isolated narrow bands (±5%) in the range of 100-500 bp from a fragmented DNA sample.  The isolated nucleic acid is PCR-ready and the fractionation is complete in 30-60 minutes.  The presented material will describe the fundamentals of our microfluidics-based solution, as well as highlight some early data and collaborative work.