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Hopkinton, MA (OBBeC) -Caliper Life Sciences has introduced two microfluidics-based separations products, the LabChip GX and LabChip GXII benchtop systems, for fast, automated, 1-D electrophoretic separations of protein, DNA, and RNA samples.

The LabChip GX represents a low price entry system targeted at genomics applications, while the GXII combines both genomics and protein research applications. The LabChip GX series of instruments will be marketed by Caliper and is designed to provide scientists novel benefits including extended walk away time, higher throughput and economical plate processing ability. Caliper also provides solutions to scientists with lower throughput needs through its collaborations with Agilent and Bio-Rad.

According to the announcement, both systems combine Caliper’s highly reproducible assay technology with advanced data analysis and visualization software. With 96-well and 384-well plate compatibility and the ability to select single wells at any location in a plate, the LabChip GX and GXII systems provide great flexibility, and performance. Leveraging Caliper’s patented microfluidics technology, users are able to thoroughly analyze samples in seconds instead of minutes, eliminating throughput bottlenecks and improving efficiency. The advanced data management software suite included with each system allows users to visualize results via an electropherogram or virtual gel view. Additionally it provides data in tabular form, which can then be analyzed or easily exported into a spreadsheet format.

“With applications ranging from protein therapeutics research to gene expression analysis to genotyping of transgenic mice, the LabChip GX and GXII represent an integral component of Caliper Life Sciences’ overall strategy of developing products that bridge the in vitro – in vivo translational gap,” said Rick Bunch, Microfluidics Product Manager, Caliper Life Sciences. “The LabChip GX and GXII provide high quality, accurate, and reproducible data that enable researchers to accelerate their discovery efforts, while saving time and money.”

The new LabChip GX instrument has been designed expressly for the needs of genomics researchers for the analysis of RNA integrity for better RT-PCR and microarray gene expression data, DNA fragment analysis for sequencing applications and genotyping transgenic mice, and numerous other applications that require accurate size, concentration, or purity analysis of nucleic acid samples. A unique feature of the LabChip GX is the ability to analyze any single sample, or a subset of samples in a microtitre plate using an intuitive GUI interface. This feature enables researchers to assess RNA integrity by randomly sampling a plate or conduct “hit picking” experiments on samples of particular interest.

The LabChip GXII system, which is a complete functional replacement of the LabChip 90, provides consistent and precise analysis of both protein and nucleic acid samples. The LabChip 90 has been widely adopted by researchers developing antibody-based therapeutics and is ideally suited for quantifying size, titre, purity, and fragmentation. This automated separations platform also enables scientists to explore the effect of multiple variables in parallel – a process which is prohibitively expensive and time-consuming using manual methods. As a direct consequence, robust methods for protein expression can be established that accelerate high throughput screening, crystallography, and analytical analyses that require large amounts of protein.