New England BioLabs has introduced its ShortCut RNAi kit, a system for the in vitro generation of short double-stranded RNA mixtures for RNAi experiments in mammalian cells.

The kit includes reagents for both high-yield in vitro transcription of large dsRNA and subsequent processing into short fragments, of 18 to 25 nucleotides, using highly concentrated RNase III with a modified reaction buffer containing manganese. The kit is good for 100 transfections and sells for $400.