38 Years After First Release, RNasin Protects COVID-19 Tests

A protein first purified and sold by Promega almost four decades ago has emerged as a crucial tool in many COVID-19 testing workflows. RNasin® Ribonuclease Inhibitor was first released in 1982, only four years after the company was started. At that time, the entire Promega catalog fit on a single sheet of 8.5 × 11” […]

From Forensic Analysis to Taco Thursday: My Experience as a Promega Intern

Today’s blog is written by guest blogger, Kali Denis, an intern in our scientific applications group. You’ll find her bio at the end of the article. A few months ago, I stood in front of my freezer at home, holding a bag with a tube full of gum that I chewed. The freezer was overflowing, […]

Minimizing Cross-Contamination Risk During Automated Processing of FFPE Tissues

This is part 3 of a three-part series on FFPE sample processing. Part 1 (link) Part 2 (link) I would like to automate FFPE processing, but I am worried about sample cross contamination, how can I minimize my risks?   As a gold standard for oncology research, hundreds of millions of FFPE samples are collected and banked worldwide. These […]

T-Vector Cloning: Questions, Answers and Tips

Q: Can PCR products generated with GoTaq DNA Polymerase be used to for T- vector cloning? A: Yes. GoTaq® DNA Polymerase is a robust formulation of unmodified Taq Polymerase. GoTaq® DNA Polymerase lacks 3’ →5’ exonuclease activity and displays terminal transferase activity that adds a 3′ deoxyadenosine (dA) to product ends. As a result, PCR products amplified using […]

Halloween Costumes: Retro Science Style

“Back when I was in the lab…”: it seems like every former scientist has a story. Kind of like Thanksgiving Dinner among your elderly relatives, scientists are quick to one-up each other with horror stories from our days at the bench—stories that included escape artist rats, a leaky sequencing gel apparatus, and the iconic radioactively […]

I Have My Luciferase Vector, Now What?

Choosing and Optimizing Transfection Methods Here in Technical Services we often talk with researchers at the beginning of their project about how to carefully design and get started with their experiments. It is exciting when you have selected the Luciferase Reporter Vector(s) that will best suit your needs; you are going to make luminescent cells! […]

Studying Autophagy in Flies Using CRISPR

Transcribed RNA can be used to study RNA structure and how it relates to function or how proteins and RNA interact. It can also be used for gene silencing using RNAi (studied more often as a possible therapeutic option) or simply serve as a molecular standard in Real-time RT-PCR. Transcribed RNA is also used in […]

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Malaria?

Malaria affects nearly half of the world’s population, with almost 80% of cases in sub-Saharan Africa and India. While there have been many strides in education and prevention campaigns over the last 30 years, there were over 200 million cases documented in 2017 with over 400,000 deaths, and the majority were young children. Despite being […]

Understanding Mechanisms of Pesticide Resistance to Thiamethoxam in the Cotton Aphid

The extensive and repetitive use of neonicotinoids has led to the development of resistance in several insect species including, the cotton aphid, A. gossypii. A. gossypii is a widely distributed pest that affects watermelons, cucumbers, pumpkin, cotton, and citrus crops, among others, making it one of the most economically important agricultural pests known. Thiamethoxam is […]

The Five Steps to miRNA Profiling

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small, non-coding RNAs that play a role in regulating cancer by acting as both tumor suppressors and oncogenes. Ranging in size from 18–25 nucleotides, miRNAs function in feedback mechanisms to regulate many cellular processes including cell proliferation, apoptosis, cell signaling and tumorigenesis (1). Not surprisingly, dysregulation of miRNA expression can have serious […]