The CVVS laboratories are well equipped for general molecular applications including nucleic acid and protein electrophoresis and Western blotting. In addition to imaging systems for standard UV and chemiluminescent detection, an Odyssey infra-red imaging system (Licor) is also available.

For DNA/RNA analysis, two microfluidic capillary systems provide the capability to analyse small samples accurately: a Bioanalyzer (Agilent Technologies) and MultiNA (Shimadzu).

Quantification and assessment of nucleic acid purity can be performed with a Nanodrop UV-Vis Spectrophotometer (Thermo Cientific) or Qubit Fluorometer (Life Technologies).

PCR reactions are set-up in dedicated workstations and amplification performed in multiple thermal cyclers. Quantitative PCR are performed on Lightcycler 480 or ABI ABI 7300 systems.  An Amplispeed cycler can be used for single cell analyses.

An EpMotion liquid handling robot (Eppendorf) is used for automating higher throughput assays.

Proprietary ‘Genomics workbench’ software (CLC-bio) is used for analysis of next generation sequencing data (contact David Simpson for further information).