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Posted by: IdRatherBeMouthPipetting
Posted on: Mon, Dec 20, 2010, 9:57 pm CST

I would have to go with the ABI PRISM in our lab. Probably the only thing that makes my work day interesting. LOL.

JanedeLartigue, if you are looking for DNA prep kits that are comparable, possibly better than Qiagen's, our purchasing manager came across a small company called chimerx, and I would highly recommend trying theirs out. We've been using them ever since, mostly due to budget issues (they are relatively inexpensive). We couldn't be happier with them, and don't forsee going back to Qiagen.

Check out their website: www.chimerx.com

Also, I'm a pretty big fan of anything NEB.

 

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Posted by: Letubeu
Posted on: Wed, Nov 24, 2010, 12:55 pm CST

I worked for a small distributor. Ya'll mentioned the Lab Armor beads, those are great. They are a luxury item, so most labs "can't afford" them, however, the labs that do purchase the beads, love 'em.

Based on consumer feedback and their resistance to change brands regardless of pricing, TPP cell culture products are like gold. Its expensive to buy, but once I converted any lab to TPP, they didn't switch again.

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Posted by: JanedeLartigue
Posted on: Tue, Nov 02, 2010, 7:15 pm CDT

I'm still in love with the LI-COR Odyssey western blot imaging system.  Costs an absolute bomb but I was lucky enough that my PhD lab was rolling in it and bought one in my final year, such an awesome machine, you can probe multiple antibodies at once, and you don't feel like blind as a mole emerging from the dark room with your western. It sucks to have to go back to dark room developing after that!


@BiochemBelle - I agree the TOPO cloning kit is usually awesome, have always used it no problems. But the PCR product I'm currently cloning appears to be toxic and I can't damn well get any colonies that have my insert in the correct orientation, so I am a little peeved with TOPO cloning at the moment!


I also agree that Cell Signaling antibodies are the bomb and I haven't found any company that beats Qiagen's DNA preps yet.


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Posted by: Suzy
Posted on: Tue, Nov 02, 2010, 6:30 pm CDT

Yay! Thanks Belle! OK- one more donation it is then.


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Posted by: biochem belle
Posted on: Tue, Nov 02, 2010, 5:54 pm CDT

Chamber slides are so much better than culturing on coverslips. That, my friends, is a pain in the ass.


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Posted by: Genomic Repairman
Posted on: Tue, Nov 02, 2010, 5:07 pm CDT

We use the same type of chamber slides from LabTek


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Posted by: biochem belle
Posted on: Tue, Nov 02, 2010, 4:39 pm CDT

Our Millipore rep hooked us up with some 8-well Millipore EZ slides, and I think I'm in love (with the slides, not the rep, although he's nice enough, but I digress).


These are fantastic little buggers if you're doing immunostaining on cells. Culture your cells on these things and then you can do all your fixation, washing, and staining with the wells on. When you're done, the little tabs on the side just snap off and the wells separate easily from the slide (as opposed to some other chamber slide systems that require a special tool). Plus I'm able to get away with 100 µl solution per well, so I can screen an entire dilution series with relatively little antibody. They are expensive, but no more so than BD chamber slides, and I'll take the Millipore ones over BD anyday.


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Posted by: biochem belle
Posted on: Mon, Oct 11, 2010, 11:21 am CDT

Hmm. I bet I know what equipment is getting written into the budget for the next grant... Tongue out

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Posted by: Jason Goldman
Posted on: Mon, Oct 11, 2010, 11:17 am CDT

I *wish* we could play tag, but it would be horribly unfair. We only have one set!

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Posted by: biochem belle
Posted on: Mon, Oct 11, 2010, 9:57 am CDT

Well, now you've gone and upped the ante, Jason. I mean, really, how are we supposed to top military grad nightvision goggles? And don't even try to pretend that you don't use them for covert tag.

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Posted by: Jason Goldman
Posted on: Fri, Oct 08, 2010, 8:17 pm CDT

I don't use any of that fancy biomed stuff, and I've never used a pipette in my life. But. I get to use reallllllllly expensive military style nightvision goggles in my research.

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Posted by: Nikkilina
Posted on: Fri, Oct 08, 2010, 8:08 pm CDT

@BiochemBelle I reuse them 5-10 times too. I just soak them overnight in DI water after I use them. I've never had any problems doing it that way. It's super amazing!

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Posted by: biochem belle
Posted on: Fri, Oct 08, 2010, 7:53 pm CDT

New lab has SnapID, and I ran through a western with the other postdoc yesterday. I am amazed. In awe. Maybe in love. A Western in 30 minutes instead of taking all friggin' day? Hellz yes!!! Plus it doesn't take up that much space on the bench. Evidently the major cost for the system is the cassettes, which according to the company you're not supposed to reuse, but it seems everyone does--our lab reuses them two or three times (washing w/ di water at the end), others supposedly reuse them closer to 5-10 times.

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Posted by: Nikkilina
Posted on: Sun, Oct 03, 2010, 7:42 pm CDT

The SNAPid works great. Once you adjust your antibody concentrations to meet the technology, the bands are perfect. I've found I even get a little higher sensitivity than I do with traditional methods.

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Posted by: becca
Posted on: Sun, Oct 03, 2010, 12:53 pm CDT

I generally had good experiences with cell signaling technology, but was HIGHLY displeased with my IkappaB zeta antibody from them. Their tech support guy was very good, but the product itself sucks. But then, I can't blame them ALL that much, since it doesn't appear anyone else has a non shite one either.

Just checked biolegend and epitomics, they don't have it. Cry

 

I love our R&D biosystems ELISAs. And when I could use it, the nanodrop (lab down the hall has one, I covet it greatly but they are hellaexpensive).

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Posted by: biochem belle
Posted on: Sun, Oct 03, 2010, 8:07 am CDT

For peeps using antibodies, you might check out Biolegend. They carry a lot of the same clones as BD Biosciences at about 1/2 the price--and that's before any discounts, which if your dept. or institution orders regularly you can often get. Generally the quality is very good, comparable to BD, and you can usually get free test samples. From what colleagues have said, they're an excellent resource if you're doing flow cytometry, because they have so many antibodies in so many different colors, plus they have experienced folks on staff that can help you set up multi (e.g. 14)-color flow setups. The only downside is that currently most of their products are for immunology (e.g. cell surface markers, cytokines), but they're expending their range of cell signaling antibodies.

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Posted by: Prabodh Kandala
Posted on: Sun, Oct 03, 2010, 6:50 am CDT

@Nikkilina, do we get publishable quality data with SNAPid? How much does it cost?

@Angela, Cell Signaling antibodies are awesome. However, recently our lab had problem with few antibodies, Those which used to work with 1:2000 dilution before are not working with 1:500 dilution now. May be problem with few lots. One more suggestion is that talk to a representative for your area and send him the list of antibodies you are planning to order in the future. They will send you a quote and you can get discounts from 5-20%. Ignore this if you are already getting one.

I never though about it, but I guess i just cannot chose a single product as favorite one. Should I go with Flowcytometer or a McCoy media bottle? Oh my gosh, I just realized that I am in love with every single thing in my lab.

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Posted by: thecancergeek
Posted on: Sun, Oct 03, 2010, 3:19 am CDT

My lab does tons and tons of western blots, and I gotta give a shout out to Cell Signaling for their primary antibodies.  Very few of them actually suck, and the ones that do, nobody else makes good ones either.  We study the PI3K/mTOR pathway (among other things) so if you need an any advice on good ones let me know.  Their secondaries are very good too, but pity they don't make many species, just anti-rabbit and anti-mouse. One Christmas Cell Signaling ran an awesome promotion something like $25 iTunes gift card for $200 of product, or something like that....the whole lab got $50 gift cards that year, since we stocked up on things we knew we would use.

Recently I've been trying some Epitomics monoclonals, and the 2 i've found have been hits: TSC2 and phospho-ATM (however this only works for human, as the datasheet indicates).

We also buy gels from BioRad, and don't have any complaints. In general they seem pretty reliable, and our rep will give us free ones if we occasionally have problems.

Dharmacon is my fave source of siRNA - the SMARTpools are what I normally get.  Usually I see no increase in efficiency beyond 10nM making them last a pretty long time.

 

 

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Posted by: Tideliar
Posted on: Fri, Oct 01, 2010, 12:46 pm CDT

It used to be my Axopatch 200B amplifier. Beautfiul piece of equiment
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Posted by: biochem belle
Posted on: Fri, Oct 01, 2010, 11:23 am CDT

Invitrogen's TOPO TA cloning kit is pretty fantastic for doing subcloning of PCR products. I've used it for pretty small products (<150 bp), and it works beautifully!
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Posted by: Thomas Joseph
Posted on: Tue, Sep 21, 2010, 9:29 am CDT

Requested a sample from Lab Armor (gave Lab Spaces a plug in the process). Let's see how well those puppies work!
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Posted by: Nikkilina
Posted on: Mon, Sep 20, 2010, 2:14 pm CDT

Brian Krueger, PhD said: I wish I knew about SNAPid during my grad work. I was drowning in westerns then.

I discovered it when I worked at Pfizer, so when I came to my post-doc, I practically demanded one since my boss is drowning in grant money.
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Posted by: Brian Krueger, PhD
Posted on: Mon, Sep 20, 2010, 2:06 pm CDT

I wish I knew about SNAPid during my grad work. I was drowning in westerns then.
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Posted by: Nikkilina
Posted on: Mon, Sep 20, 2010, 2:04 pm CDT

I do a ton of Westerns, so I love the Millipore SNAPid system. It takes half an hour from the time you finish your transfer to the imager. It's a HUGE time saver and I haven't had any problems with getting great blots out of it.
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Posted by: Suzy
Posted on: Sun, Sep 19, 2010, 8:52 pm CDT

I met the Founder/CEO, Rich Jarvis, at a conference this past year. Very cool and nice guy. If you go to their booth, he'll most likely be there meeting scientists.

They'll probably be at Neuroscience, I imagine, since it has such a big exhibitor section. Or maybe Cell Bio.
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Posted by: Genomic Repairman
Posted on: Sun, Sep 19, 2010, 7:28 pm CDT

I use the LabArmor beads and love them. A service rep followed up with me to see how they are working out and I told him they rocked! And to be even more kick ass, the dude sent me a free shirt. Love those dudes.
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Posted by: Suzy
Posted on: Thu, Sep 16, 2010, 6:58 pm CDT

I could never understand how so many people adopted the capillary system. Same with systems like Cepheid and Rotorgene. I understand the optics are great but set up must be a major pain in the ass.

Geeka- I've used that SuperBlock too. I'm not doing much protein work now, but when we did, I think we bought all the protein ladders from Biorad.

One thing we all use for our small heat blocks are those bath beads from Lab Armor. Those are pretty cool.
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Posted by: Thomas Joseph
Posted on: Thu, Sep 16, 2010, 6:40 am CDT

Jade: The 480 is a 96 (or 384) well plate system. I used one of the first ever capillary PCR systems (Idaho Technologies) back in graduate school ... it was a demo. It was a pain in the rear. Yah, it cut down cycling and reagent time, but by the time you got your samples loaded and ran (and breaking 20 capillaries in the process) it all seemed to even out. We stuck with our MJ's.
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Posted by: Geeka
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 6:30 pm CDT

I'm an image person, so the thing that really rocks my world is the CRI Nuance Liquid tunable crystal filter Camera. It automatically subtracts background, and you can do 9 color immunofluorescence/IHC.
I also like the newer invitrogen/ABI personal taqman thermocycler. I don't remember what it's brand name is, because we always referred to it by it's nickname (Yossarian).
Pierce's/Fisher's "Superblock" is some sort of magical elixir that gets rid of ever single nonspecific band I've thrown at it.

I agree with everyone else: BioRad sucks ass. We were actually forbidden to buy anything from them in my PhD lab.
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Posted by: Suzy
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 4:40 pm CDT

Tom- isn't it a pain to load those little glass capillaries on the LC? Or is the 480 a plate model?

We use an ABI Step-One for qPCR and it has served us well. The software is super easy.
We don't use their chemistry though- it's like 3X the price of everyone else even with their discount.

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Posted by: Brian Krueger, PhD
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 3:16 pm CDT

I hate the biorad thermal cycler my boss bought for this lab before I took it over. It's an absolute piece of shit. I wish I had the mastercycler we had in my PhD lab.
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Posted by: Genomic Repairman
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 3:07 pm CDT

The ChemiDoc works pretty well. I've got a nasty post building about BioRad and some of their shite equipment.
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Posted by: Thomas Joseph
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 2:47 pm CDT

Roche Lightcycler 480

And seriously GR ... BioRad? The only thing BioRad was ever good for, IMNSHO, were the t-shirts they donated to us for our softball team back when I was in grad school. Ok, they make good protein boxes and power sources, but their imaging and real time systems have sucked so hard that I will actively disparage them whenever the opportunity arises (like right now).
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Posted by: Genomic Repairman
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 1:15 pm CDT

If ninjas used pipets, they'd use Rainin. Those things are so smooth and accurate and Brian is 100% right about the tips.
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Posted by: Brian Krueger, PhD
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 10:27 am CDT

They're the shit. You don't have to pound the tips on or break your finger ejecting them.
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Posted by: Suzy
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 9:59 am CDT

OMG- you are so right on with Nanodrop. I wish I had that in graduate school!

What's so special about Rainin Pipettes?
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Posted by: Genomic Repairman
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 9:22 am CDT

-MacVector
-Invitrogen Countess
-AKTA FPLC
-NanoVue spec
-Rainin pipets (wish we had them in my lab)
-Retrospect Backup System
-BioRad ChemiDoc XRS+
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Posted by: Brian Krueger, PhD
Posted on: Tue, Sep 14, 2010, 5:43 am CDT

Ependorf mastercycler gradient pcr system, nanodrop 2000, rainin LTS pipettes :)
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