Beckman Partners with NEB to Streamline NGS

Beckman Coulter Life Sciences and New England Biolab’s (NEB) are partnering to improve sample preparation of  Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) kit. While Beckman will distribute, develop and support automation for NEBNext sample preparation kits, NEB will bring expertise in reagents, chemistry and protocols. The partnership will allow automation of high throughput NGS processes with a faster workflow.

“NATURAL-FIT”

“Beckman Coulter’s focus on providing our NGS customers with a top-notch portfolio of automated sample prep solutions makes a partnership with NEB, a world leading provider of quality reagent systems for molecular biology research, a natural fit,” says Alisa Jackson, senior marketing manager for automated genomics solutions at Beckman. “Our joint collaborations with scientific researchers have already led to the development of high-quality methods demonstrated to improve efficiency, throughput, and results for some of the most challenging sample inputs.”

Beckman Coulter’s Biomek liquid handling platforms will optimize methods for the NEBNext kits. To improve overall workflows, methods are also included that automate Beckman Coulter’s AMPure XP kit for DNA purification, the SPRIselect kit for high throughput DNA size selection, and the qPCR setup and normalization processes.

The first collection of automated NEBNext methods were developed on the NGS configurations of the Biomek 4000 and the Biomek FXP Dual Arm Multi 96 and Span 8 platforms.Collaboration was provided by scientists from the Genomics and Molecular Biology Shared Resource (GMBSR) at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth and the Norris Cotton Cancer Center. The methods create up to 96 sequence-ready libraries that generate quality results on the Illumina and Ion Torrent sequencing platforms.

Sources: neb.com and beckmancoulter.com