June 10, 2013
Life Technologies Corporation
(NASDAQ: LIFE) today announces it has begun commercial shipments of the
QuantStudio™ 3D Digital PCR System
, the first chip-based instrument designed for this rapidly growing segment of the genetic analysis market. Featuring the simplest workflow and smallest footprint available on the market, the benchtop platform is designed for experiments requiring absolute quantification of targeted DNA molecules and disruptively priced at
to enable broad accessibility to all laboratories.
Scientists worldwide commonly use real-time PCR (polymerase chain reaction) to amplify and quantify nucleic acids. A variation of that powerful technology, digital PCR goes beyond the limits of real-time PCR and provides absolute quantification of DNA samples, making the application ideally suited for accurately detecting rare genetic mutations important in cancer or infectious diseases.
"Good research depends on three things: researchers' techniques, appropriate funding and sample quality. Compared to in-situ hybridization methods, digital PCR has a direct impact on these components," said
, senior biomedical scientist, Royal Surrey County Hospital in the U.K. "The great advantage of the QuantStudio 3D is that it makes copy number variation research, for example, more readily available and cost effective as you are able to probe a higher number of samples at lower price points. The data achieved in my lab correlate well with our previous results."
The QuantStudio™ 3D Digital PCR System is designed to be affordable and easy to use for a wide variety of laboratory settings. The simple workflow, combined with the system's chip-based approach, reduces the number of required hands-on steps to begin experiments – reducing the risk of sample contamination and loss of DNA normally associated with droplet-based systems on the market. Once a sample has been loaded onto the chip, the system takes less than one minute to return initial data.