Product Reviews

I tried countless combinations of qPCR reagents, buffers and primer sets before contacting KAPA Biosystems for a sample of their KAPA SYBR® FAST qPCR Kit (Universal), somewhat in desperation.
 

I had immediate success and have never looked back. I trust the ability of the enzyme to generate reliable results quick and simply, typically without optimisation. I refuse to use other reagents now.

Dr. Phillippa Taberlay, Ph.D - The Garvan Institute of Medical Research

We have been using the 4titude 96 well PCR plates from Anachem with both our ABI PCR machines and sequencers for about 2 months now. We have found the change in supplier to be hassle free and most importantly we have experienced no variation in our results; with the added benefit of significant cost savings.

We have been using the 4titude 96 well PCR plates from Anachem with both our ABI PCR machines and sequencers for about 2 months now. We have found the change in supplier to be hassle free and most importantly we have experienced no variation in our results; with the added benefit of significant cost savings.

We have been using the 4titude 96 well PCR plates from Anachem with both our ABI PCR machines and sequencers for about 2 months now. We have found the change in supplier to be hassle free and most importantly we have experienced no variation in our results; with the added benefit of significant cost savings.

We have been using the 4titude 96 well PCR plates from Anachem with both our ABI PCR machines and sequencers for about 2 months now. We have found the change in supplier to be hassle free and most importantly we have experienced no variation in our results; with the added benefit of significant cost savings.

I tried countless combinations of qPCR reagents, buffers and primer sets before contacting KAPA Biosystems for a sample of their KAPA SYBR® FAST qPCR Kit (Universal), somewhat in desperation.
 

I had immediate success and have never looked back. I trust the ability of the enzyme to generate reliable results quick and simply, typically without optimisation. I refuse to use other reagents now.

Dr. Phillippa Taberlay, Ph.D - The Garvan Institute of Medical Research

“I used DNAReleasy on C. elegans and was really impressed with the results; DNAReleasy lysed the worms in just 7 minutes!”
Research Fellow – University College London

"Before qPCR was adopted for library quantification, cluster density was extremely variable. Implementation of the KAPA Library Quantification Kit into our sequencing workflows resulted in a significant reduction in variability across multiple libraries, negating the need for cluster amplification titration runs".
- The Broad Institute, Cambridge, MA U.S.A.
 

I have now tried the KAPA HiFi HotStart enzyme and sequenced cloned PCR fragment to see how many introduced PCR mutation this enzyme gives.

Template: cDNA from the C2C12 cell line

Expected product size: 2.3 kb

Reaction setup: As described in the manufacturers manual

Cycles:

95° 3'
98° 20" 60° 15" 72° 90" 40x
72° 3'

Cloned and sequenced three individual clones.

Mutation: 0 (zeeeeero)

I have also used this enzyme for low complexity amplifications (plasmid as template and 16 cycles) and have not seen a single introduced mutation.

KAPA HiFi HotStart is absolutely the best enzyme I have ever used when high fidelity is desired and is my future choice for all my PCR applications, instead of the many other enzymes I have used and tried over nearly two decades in science.

KAPA HiFi HotStart has also, in my hands, proven to be very robust; it has worked every time even with known difficult template and primer pairs.

Göran Hjälm, Assc. Professor
Uppsala University
Sweden

The KAPA HiFi and KAPA HiFi Hotstart DNA Polymerases are really amazing! At first, I and my lab mate hesitate to use these products since we are not familiar with it and we are afraid to take the risk considering that we just have few DNA samples and a limited time to finish our work. However, our lack of confidence to these products leads us to be delayed. We have used Hifi DNA Polymerases from some renowned companies like Invitrogen, Promega, Roche and Stratagene for a long period of time but we never got such outstanding result. HiFi DNA Polymerases from KAPA were able to amplify our desired fragment up to 9Kb. The bands produced were so intense and there were no extra or any unspecific bands. Furthermore, these DNA Polymerases need no optimization. This is excellent, making PCR easier, more interesting and exciting!

Jeanette Lescano-Balindong, Researcher
Plant Breeding, Genetics and Biotechnology
International Rice Research Institute, Manilla
 

I had been trying to amplify a GC rich region of genomic DNA with poor quality samples. I tested several enzymes including Amplitaq 360, Thermo-Start, Herculase II and HotStar, but without much success. I was very impressed with the results of the Kapa Biosystems Robust PCR Kit, as it has given me much better amplification than any other enzyme and combination of buffers I have tried.

We switched to Kapa Biosystems SYBR Fast qPCR kit because we noticed a significant improvement in PCR efficiency and steepness of amplification curves.

I work for the Microarray Core facility of the University of Basel, Switzerland. We lead genome-wide studies on the RNA (gene expression and alternative splicing) and the DNA (SNPs and Copy Number Variation). Real-time PCR is a key player for validating our results. We own a Corbett Research Rotor-Gene 3000A. After using various SYBR Green Kits over the past years we switched to SyBr Fast kit from Kapa Biosystems because we noticed a significant improvement in PCR efficiency, and especially in steepness of amplification curves. What I appreciate the most is the fact this kit works very nicely for the vast majority of primers we design without optimization and for various applications (Gene expression as well as DNA Copy Number). This universality makes our real-time PCR assays very fast to establish and our results more reliable.

Philippe Demouging, Molecular Psychology, University of Basel
 

I had been experiencing poor yield attempting to amplify with Expand, a product that should have been trivial -- a 200-bp product from a plasmid template. So, I tried all 10 PCR enzymes we have in the lab with the same primers and template and the same cycling parameters (a rather generic program, optimized for none of the enzymes) using the basic buffer conditions for each enzyme, and estimated the yield by running a portion of the reactions on a gel.
The rankings, by yield:
1) Invitrogen Amplitaq (low fidelity) in Roche Taq buffer (however, a non-specific band was also amplified)
2) (TIE) Pfx50 and Kapa HiFi
3) Pfu Ultra
4) Pfu Turbo
5) Phusion
6) Expand plus 5% DMSO (since it didn't work well without DMSO in previous trials)
7) Qiagen Taq (a non-specific band was also amplified) Pfu and Pfx failed to amplify any detectable product.
For a high-fidelity application (like this test example), I'd choose Kapa HiFi. So far so good!
 

Scientist at the University of California at Berkley

I tested four samples with both ABI and KAPA SYBR FAST reagents. The KAPA SYBR reagent can bring down the Ct values by 1.5-2, which is amazing. I will go ahead and use it for my future CHIP experiments.

Junqi Song, Duke University

I tried out the Kapa2G robust kit. We're super happy with it. We first tested it on gDNA and the amount of template needed was very minimal, 2ng in a 25ul reaction, which is great because we often have precious gDNA samples. We also used it to amplify directly off serial dilutions of lymphoblast cell line suspensions. We found we were able to amplify off of between 300 and 500 cells direct. We're very happy with that aspect as well.

Researcher at a prestigious Genome Centre in Canada

I tested the new Bambanker system from Anachem with my Calu-3 cell line. I was very pleased with the results I obtained from the Bambanker and could see an increase in yield of approximately 20%. I found the system to be extremely easy to use as I didn’t need to perform any dilutions or use any additives. It is very simple, I just added Bambanker to my cells and placed them into the -80ºC freezer before transferring to liquid nitrogen the next day.

I looked at Anachem's Taq Mastermix because of the cost savings and its ease of use. I used the Taq Mastermix for colony screening and found it to be very efficient. Not only are the bands clear but, in my case, there are hardly any false positives.

At the Department of Surgery, Royal Free Hospital London we were pleased to evaluated the new serum-free medium BAMBANKER™ that’s now available in the UK from Anachem Ltd.

Our first trial was with primary human aortic smooth muscle cells that were frozen in accordance with the operating procedure for Bambanker, stored at -80oC and successfully revived a week later. Our second test was with a SW620 human colon cancer cell line, which again was frozen in accordance with the operating procedure and stored at -80oC for a few days. The cells were again successfully revived.

We did not calculate the % recovery but we were very happy with the resulting cells after revival. Because of these trials, we feel that the advantages of the simple method employed and good cell recovery achieved with the Bambanker solution are considerable and we will definitely be using it from now on to freeze all our cells in the cell bank.
 

I have recently changed from my Roche Extraction Kit to the Anachem Gel Recovery Kit (AM-113163) and I am delighted with the results I am getting. The Anachem kit gives us intense bands and great results every time. And as an added bonus we can use this kit for both gel extraction and PCR clean up, saving us money and lab space as we don’t need two different kits.

I looked at the KeyPrep Plasmid DNA extraction kit because of the cost savings and have found these kits to be excellent. The yield of the plasmids is not only high compared to other commercial kits, but also produced very good sequencing results. Almost all of the sequencing results I obtained from pGEM-T originated plasmids, in DH5-a cells, isolated using the KeyPrep Plasmid DNA extraction kit, contained a minimum of 800 clean bases using M13F or M13R primers.

Anachem pipette clinics are superb. I recently sent a large collection of old, dusty and frankly shabby looking pipettes off to your service centre and they came back looking like new.
 

Product: Rainin Spacesaver pipette tips.

We are a small company with low staff numbers and tight budgets. The Rainin 'Tip Towers' - as we call them - are great for ease of use, time saving and economical but great quality.

Deepan Shah

Orla Protein Technologies Ltd

"Pipet-Lite XLS is a stylish, authoritative and sturdy pipette with a smooth action."

Having a reliable and easy to use set of pipettes is essential for every researcher and, although they are the unsung heroes, they are undoubtedly one of the most important pieces of equipment used in everyday research. Inaccurate and cumbersome to use pipettes can make life difficult at more than one level and therefore, choosing the right pipettes is crucial. Having tried almost every pipette on the market, my lab seems to be divided between the Eppendorf, Finnpipette and Gilson brands. Ignoring special offers, all three can be purchased for essentially the same price and so it’s all down to personal preference. Having started in the lab in the early eighties, I was a traditional Gilson user but I was keen to test the accuracy, reliability, and robustness of the new Pipet-Lite XLS series to determine if they were as good as they looked.

The range of liquid handling from 0.2 μL (L-2XLS) up to 20 mL (L-20MLXLS) is impressive to say the least and covers every possible experimental need. I was particularly pleased to see the pipette range include volumes not catered for by the other brands e.g. L-300XLS and L-2000XLS. The accuracy was excellent and I experienced no shift in the pipette volume because of the locking system even after a large number of samples. The Pipet-Lite XLS is certainly not cheap and flimsy but a stylish, authoritative and sturdy piece of equipment with a smooth action and easy to read display that is remarkably easy to use and clean. The only downside I noted was the fact that the metal plunger and spring were uncoated making the pipette unsuitable for use with corrosive fluids, so maybe there should be a warning to unsuspecting users or an alternative model could be sold for such applications. These pipettes come with radio frequency identification as standard and, although a nice idea, I didn’t see it as a particularly useful feature but it might have its uses in another lab. After having used the Pipet-Lite XLS for an hour, I switched back to my Gilson pipette and was amazed at the difference in resistance and how much pressure I had to exert to dispense and the stiffness of the Gilson tip ejection.

I fully recommend the Pipet-Lite XLS as a nice to handle, low resistance pipette for everyday use and I am sure that once you have tried them you will assign your old ones to the drawer - just as I have.

We purchased a number of RAININ's Pipet-Lite pipettes from Anachem and we are very happy with them. They are nice comfortable pipettes and I would definitely recommend them to other pipette users.
Sally Swift, Institute of Cancer Research

RAININ Pipet-Lite pipettes are truly superior to all other pipetting tools in the most important aspects, such as accuracy, ease-of-use, and reliability.

Ludmilla Bardina, Sr. Research Coordinator
Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, NY

I just purchased EDP3 Multichannel pipettes for the entire research group.

They are easier to use than [the other brand]. EDP3 has long-lasting batteries, the tips fit like a glove, and they’re ergonomically-correct.

Since we purchased EDP3 multichannel pipettes, other research groups have asked how they can score LTS pipettes!

EDP3 multichannel pipettes bring only one word to mind: awesome!

Lynne Cregar, Sr. Research Associate
AXYS Pharmaceuticals, CA

I was diagnosed with deQuervain’s disease caused by pipetting. My fellow PCR workers were also experiencing pain in their hands and wrists. This pain was directly attributed to tip ejection pressure, as well as general pipetting activities.

We tried two different ergonomic pipette designs. EDP3 Pipettes with LTS got our vote of approval for the extreme ease of tip ejection.

We have been using EDP3 pipettes exclusively for one year now and I wish I had known about them before I needed them.

I recommend that everyone who does extended pipetting buy an EDP3 pipette before the pain makes it necessary.

Gloria E. Dettleff, Molecular Diagnostics
Vet. Adm. Medical Center (JC), St. Louis, MO

EDP3™ electronic pipettes with LTS are much less stressful on the hands; the tips eject so easily.

We require precise and reproducible results when qualifying and testing a new LabChip™. Working with only 1 μl of material, the pipettes and tips we use must be precise and accurate at small volumes from user to user. That’s why we chose EDP3.

Dr. Stephane Mouradian, Research Scientist
Caliper Technologies, Mountain View, CA

Our lab uses 10 μL and 200 μL pipettes in PCR hoods. Initially, we chose Pipet-Lite from a Rainin promotion. Now I wish we all had them at our stations. Pipet-Lite is so easy to use. We have to go back and forth between the old ones and the LTS.

Boy, can you tell the difference! The lab loves the new Pipet-Lite. They are so light. No more jamming tips on and then struggling to eject them. You have made our PCR experiments easier to setup.
 

Thank you, Rainin!

Bobbie Brewington, Veterinary Microbiology/Preventive Medicine
Iowa State University, Iowa City, IA

I use 10 μL to 1000 μL pipettes for more than 4 hours a day. I switched to Pipet-Lite with LTS because I suffered from repetitive motion injury on both wrists that was treated surgically.

I like Pipet-Lite for its ease of handling, especially with tip ejection. It’s less stressful on my hands even after a long period of pipetting. My goal is to be able to eventually convert all our pipettes to your LTS system/design.

Rosario F. Bowen, Medicine
Vet. Adm. Medical Center, IUPUI, Indianapolis, IN

Rainin’s Pipet-Lite Pipettes are accurate, comfortable and lightweight.

I find Pipet-Lite superior to other brands. With LTS (LiteTouch Tip Ejection) there is no need of “hitting” to attach the tips and they eject easily.

Congratulations on a good tool!

Laslo Furu
Internal Medicine, Yale Univ. School of Medicine
New Haven, CT

Since using Pipet-Lite™ for just four months my wrists have really improved.

Pipet-Lite is so easy, absolutely no pressure is required. The tips go on easily and eject with just a touch of the button. It didn’t take me long to discover I didn’t need to jam the tips on. The volume adjustment can be done with one hand, it’s so easy!

Accuracy is a major issue in our lab. Since converting to Pipet-Lite we’ve seen no change; our results are just as accurate. Our whole lab loves Rainin Pipet-Lite pipettes.

Jennifer Pearson, R&D Biologist
Roche Diagnostics, Berkeley, CA