Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE: A) today announced the introduction of its SurePrint G3 Microarrays. These third-generation Agilent microarrays contain up to one million probes on a standard 1in. x 3 in. glass slide. Initial applications are array-based comparative genomic hybridization (aCGH) and copy number variation (CNV), with other applications to follow.
"We're excited to launch the new SurePrint G3 Microarrays as they will address our customers' needs for higher resolution CGH/CNV data while providing a lower cost per data point," said Chris Grimley, Agilent senior marketing director, Genomics. "In addition, with the launch of this product we've significantly increased our manufacturing capacity, enabling us to meet the rapidly growing demand for Agilent's microarrays."
The new generation SurePrint G3 arrays continue to deliver the unsurpassed sensitivity and flexibility that Agilent microarrays have become known for, thanks to high fidelity optimized probes and Agilent's SurePrint inkjet technology, which enables custom array content with no compromise in cost.
SurePrint G3 Microarrays for CGH/CNV are available in four standard formats: A single million-feature array per slide (1x1M), and several multipack formats: 2x400K, 4x180K, and 8x60K. Agilent offers a catalog CGH microarray for each format as well as the four custom formats. Providing multiple arrays per slide greatly reduces cost per experiment, enabling researchers to perform larger sample studies with the same budget.
By using Agilent's eArray online tool to design custom arrays, researchers can choose from more than 24 million predesigned, in silico-validated aCGH probes, spanning non-repeat regions of the genome. eArray lets customers harness the flexibility of the Agilent SurePrint ink jet microarray fabrication platform. Custom arrays from Agilent are available at no additional cost to the user.
As part of the new portfolio of catalog products, Agilent is introducing a 2x400K CNV catalog array, which is designed to cover the known CNV regions from the Database of Genomic Variants. This is the first of several CNV-focused arrays that Agilent will be releasing in 2009.
The new catalog arrays are the most comprehensive whole-genome arrays available that provide high density coverage of coding and non-coding regions, emphasizing known genes, promoters, miRNAs, CNVs, disease regions, pseudoautosomal and telomeric regions.
"We have recently tested the new Agilent one-million-CGH microarray and our initial results are extremely encouraging, showing equivalent quality and performance to the earlier formats from Agilent," said early-access user Charles Lee, Ph.D., associate professor, Harvard Medical School and Brigham & Women's Hospital. "We are excited to be using these new arrays for several structural variation projects such as for the 1,000 genomes project and other large-scale, population-based CNV studies."