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When it comes to animal research, there's no getting around one simple fact: It's expensive. Between care, housing, and feeding, live animals can take a serious bite out of a researchers' bottom line. That's especially true if that researcher is...

Ten years after the first draft human genome was announced, genomic science is finally beginning to pay dividends in the healthcare arena. A few examples: In November 2009, Richard Lifton of Yale University applied "next-gen" DNA sequencing to correctly diagnose a patient, thought possibly to suffer from a renal condition such as Bartter syndrome, with

It's been nearly 30 years since W. Neal Burnette first coined the term "Western blotting" to describe the electrophoretic transfer of protein gels onto nitrocellulose membranes¹, and in many ways the technique remains exactly the same. The gel transfer "sandwich" Burnette describes in detail, for instance, would be...

High resolution melt (HRM) analysis is one of those “why didn’t I think of that?” special twists on basic nucleotide behavior during PCR, in which melting curves are compared to detect sequence differences. HRM analysis is seeing a boom of interest recently. “HRM is emerging so rapidly that it is...

Because of increases in stem cell research, the market for CO₂ incubators has become more interesting—and more discerning. Users are demanding increased...

Not that long ago, analyzing the phosphorylation of a given cellular protein could best be described as painful. If a researcher wanted to know whether a particular protein's phosphorylation status changed in response...

Who would have thought that the humble nucleic acids described decades ago by Watson and Crick would one day be eyed as therapeutic or diagnostic agents world-wide? With customized modifications, today’s oligonucleotides are doing more than probing blots in the lab. And in many cases, buying is cheaper than...

Immunofluorescence has become such an important tool for biologists that one can now find it in almost any area, helping to illuminate the answers to questions big and small. Challenges for the technique include getting smaller (labeling distinct molecules) and more...

If you want an inkling of how hot the microRNA field is, just look at miRBase. In April...

Apoptosis – programmed cell death – is a cell’s way of politely kicking the bucket when its time has come. A vital part of nearly all normal processes, apoptosis is so important to the

The use of human tissue in the life sciences is hardly new. In 1951, a researcher at Johns Hopkins University created the first human cell line with samples taken from an unwitting cancer patient. Named HeLa cells, they went on to serve crucial roles in the development of the polio vaccine and in the study of many diseases. These days, human tissue research is more important than ever.

It's one thing to work in a research lab: cobbling funds together from research grants, conducting experiments in 96-well plates using stand-alone benchtop equipmentequipment, and meticulously tweaking reagent concentrations, incubation times, and column densities. But as R turns to D and it's time to scale up and start producing product, a host of other considerations come into play.

Holding back the power of our immune systems is no small feat—and that’s just what regulatory T cells (Tregs) do. Their ability to suppress unwanted immune responses makes them one of...

If you've ever worked with cell cultures, you probably know the agony of manual cell counting. It's a fact of life in the cell culture hood: Before you can run an experiment, you need to know...

Introducing new genes into your cells, or silencing others, is easier each year as the technology and reagents for cellular have steadily improved. And the improvement shows...

It really is science, right—not magic? Finding the best conditions for your PCR protocols can be frustrating and time-consuming, but it is becoming...

Is the most frequently used piece of lab equipment also the least considered? In a sense, yes. No hardware gets more of a workout in molecular biology labs...

The power of nuclear receptors should not be underestimated. However, we have yet to understand fully how these fascinating molecules work, though we know they are crucial for many important developmental processes, as well as...

Since the immunoassay was first described more than half a century ago it has become a mainstay in clinical and research labs alike. Innovations in...

The classical view of cancer was of a progressive series of mutations conferring growth advantages, such that the cell is no longer constrained by the biochemical limitations of other, normal cells. No growth...

Don't have time to pour your own agarose gel, make your own buffers, and wait more than an hour for the results? You're in luck, because nucleic acid electrophoresis is getting easier every day. Using precast gels, all-in-one kits, and even...

The twin goals of disaster preparedness and conservation have inspired a growing movement toward greener and more energy efficient laboratories. Green lab initiatives include more efficient instrumentation, green building design, and the use of nontoxic...

Real-time PCR, or quantitative PCR (qPCR), quickly became an important evaluative tool for researchers needing to quantify the product of a PCR reaction – yet it is an unfinished technique. Despite its widespread use, or perhaps because of it, qPCR is still...

The once onerous lab task of cell separation has finally turned a corner, according to...

Compared to purifying and fractionating protein samples, the seeming impossibility of finding a needle in a haystack turns out to be quite easy. Burn away the hay. Use a metal detector. Eureka! Let the sewing begin. The haystack idiom best suits the task of...

There's change in the air in the world of transcriptome analysis. Once the domain of microarrays, transcriptome analysis (that is, gene expression monitoring on a genome-wide scale) is now associated with...

Thermal cyclers, also known as PCR machines or thermocyclers, have come a long way from the earliest models. Continual demands of researchers for faster, shorter, and more accurate PCR protocols have resulted in beneficial...

Glycoproteins are known to play essential roles in numerous biological functions. Many are involved in cell signaling events that are essential to cell migration, cell adhesion, and immune function as well as tumor growth and metastasis. With such a central role in a multitude of important biological processes, it's no wonder that glycobiology is...

The advent of microarray technology enabled massive parallel processing of DNA (or RNA) screening experiments. Made of an orderly set of DNA spots attached to a solid support, such as...

The landscape of cell culture looks much more vibrant these days. Gone is the bland horizon of a few traditional formulations. Now that scene most resembles a multicolored tableau of options that suit a multitude of uses and cell types. While classic reagents and tools still pervade laboratory shelves, the newest products provide...