Systems for Determination of RNA Quality Compared by UK Standards Institute

The use of microarray technology has revolutionized the fields of molecular biology and genetics. However, concerns have been raised over the numerous potential sources of variation that can affect assay consistency and data quality. Previous studies have highlighted RNA integrity as one source that has a major effect on microarray data quality.

To date methods for determining RNA integrity have been extremely labor intensive and time consuming. Lately, an automated system, the Agilent Technologies (Santa Clara, CA, USA) 2100 Bioanalyzer, which utilizes a microfluidic-based platform has become available. An even more recent innovation is the Lab 901(Edinburgh, United Kingdom) ScreenTape R6K electrophoresis system. This system employs precast, multilane gels and microfluidics that enable semiautomated operation with simplified sample handling and reduced assay times.

The April 1, 2010, online edition of the journal BMC Research Notes contained a paper comparing the Agilent and Lab901 systems. Investigators at GLC Limited (London, United Kingdom), the United Kingdom's designated National Measurement Institute for chemical and biochemical analysis, analyzed a panel of intentionally degraded RNA samples on the two systems. They reported that results were similar and that the RIN values obtained with the Bioanalyzer were comparable to the SDV units generated by the Lab901 system.

The authors of the study concluded that, "The ScreenTape platform is comparable to the Bioanalyzer platform in terms of reproducibility and discrimination between different levels of RNA degradation. The robust nature of the SDV metric qualifies it as an alternative metric for RNA sample quality control, and a useful predictor of downstream microarray performance.”

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Agilent Technologies
Lab 901
GLC Limited