Separations-based Assays

With  mobility shift assays, the product and substrate are electrophoretically separated, thereby minimizing interferences and yielding the highest data quality available. Z' factors for LabChip 3000® enzymatic assays are routinely in the 0.8 to 0.9 range.

For cell-based assays, cells move past the detector one at a time, so that they can be measured independently, and so that potentially interfering fluorescent compounds do not interfere. The result is fewer false positives.

Microfluidic Format Saves Precious Reagents

The channels of the LabChip® devices are 10-50 um in diameter, which means that many LabChip assays use much less reagent than would be required for the equivalent plate-based assay. For example, running cell-based calcium flux assays on a LabChip 3000®  needs 100 times fewer cells per datapoint compared to equivalent plate-based assays. For limited cell availability, e.g.  working with primary cell lines, this offers a way to perform more assays than would otherwise be possible.

Images and movie provided by courtesy of Caliper Life Sciences