Genetics

News Genetics

• Thermo Fisher Scientific to Acquire Life Technologies Corporation

  Thermo Fisher Scientific and Life Technologies Corporation have signed a definitive agreement under which Thermo Fisher will acquire Life Technologies for $76.00 in cash per fully diluted common share, or approximately $13.6 billion, plus the assumption of net debt at close ($2.2 billion as of year more

• OGT opens New York office and appoints US sales team

  Oxford Gene Technology (OGT) announced that it has opened a new office in Tarrytown, New York to support and grow its cytogenetics arrays and next generation sequencing business in the US.The new office will enable OGT to provide hands-on technical support and training to its existing US customers, more

• Diabetes genes in South Asians discovered by Imperial College

  An international team of researchers led by Imperial College London has identified six new genetic variants that could potentially be the causative agents of type 2 diabetes in South Asian populations (Pakistani, Indian, Bangladeshi, and Sri Lankan). The findings published in Nature Genetics, give s more

White papers Genetics

• LightCycler® 480 System: High-throughput Gene Expression and Genotyping Analysis - A Performance Study
  

  The LightCycler® 480 System is a novel platform for rapid gene expression and melting curve-based genotyping for medium- and high-throughput. In order to assess the performance and ease-of-use of the complete LightCycler® 480 System (instrument, software, and reagents) in an academic laboratory setting we scheduled a high-throughput project including gene expression (39 targets in 88 samples = 3,400 expression values) as well as genotyping applications (3,808 genotypes; 14 SNPs in 288 samples). The project, involving five technicians and two graduate students, was accomplished within 15 working days. more

• Real-Time PCR Quality Control for Gene Expression
  

  Quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) has become the de facto standard for nucleic acid quantification. This achievement is due in large part to its sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, large dynamic range of linear quantification, and its speed. The qPCR technology has matured to a ready-to-use commonly available method in most molecular biology laboratories. Nevertheless, the reliability of the final quantification result depends heavily on all elements in the workflow, such as the quality of the input template (integrity and absence of inhibitors), the PCR assay (specificity, efficiency, limit of detection), and normalization strategy (validated reference genes). more

• Genotypes in Smokers: Correlations with Smoking Behavior
  

  Smoking behavior is influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. Moreover, smoking initiation and smoking persistence have a heritability of at least 50%. A large body of work has been dedicated to associating multiple genetic markers of neurobiological pathways previously linked to addiction and smoking such as the central dopaminergic, serotoninergic, and nicotinergic pathways with different aspects of smoking behavior. In order to investigate the feasability of future genetic analyses, we genotyped 14 SNPs in 288 samples of addicted smokers using the LightCycler® 480 System with HybProbe assays. more

Websites Genetics