Akonni Biosystems this week introduced a new family of TruTip extraction products for rapidly purifying human genomic DNA on the Hamilton Microlab STAR line of robotic liquid handlers.
Starting from fresh or frozen blood, buffy coat, and soon tissue or cells, the new TruTip kits extract superior quality gDNA simultaneously from eight to 96 samples in 57 minutes, Akonni said. The system does not require a magnetic head, vacuum manifold, centrifuge, or other space-consuming or expensive capital equipment. The procedure eliminates PCR inhibition due to bead carryover and errors due to clogging typically caused by vacuum manifolds.
The TruTip family of products uses a porous nucleic acid binding matrix embedded in a pipette tip, and extracts DNA or RNA using chaotropic salt chemistry. The kits can be used with a variety of downstream analytical tools, including qPCR, real-time PCR, digital PCR, microarrays, mid-multiplex bead-based systems, and traditional and next-generation sequencing systems.
TruTip genomic DNA Kits for use on the STAR line of workstations are now available for early-access customers. TruTip applications for extracting genomic DNA from saliva collected using the Oragene Discover and Oragene Dx Collection Kits from DNA Genotek, a subsidiary of OraSure Technologies, will be available soon, Akonni said.
Illumina has launched its TruSeq Stranded mRNA and Total RNA sequencing sample prep kits.
The kits enable RNA-seq studies from low-quality samples, such as formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded samples, according to the company. The kits come either in 48-sample, low-throughput format containing 12 of 24 total available indexes; or 96-sample, high-throughput format.