LATEST IN THE WORLD OF BIOTECHNOLOGY

Chicken egg whites - answer to three-dimensional cell culture systems
More and more laboratories are seeking to develop three-dimensional cell culture systems that allow them to test their new techniques and drugs in a system that more closely mimics the way in which cells grow.

DNA Amplification and Detection Made Simple
Twenty-three years ago, a man musing about work while driving down a California highway revolutionized molecular biology when he envisioned a technique to make large numbers of copies of a piece of DNA rapidly and accurately. Known as the polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, Kary Mullis's technique involves separating the double strands of a DNA fragment into single-strand templates by heating it, attaching primers that initiate the copying process, using DNA polymerase to make a copy of each strand from free nucleotides floating around in the reaction mixture, detaching the primers, then repeating the cycle using the new and old strands as templates. Since its discovery in 1983, PCR has made possible a number of procedures we now take for granted, such as DNA fingerprinting of crime scenes, paternity testing, and DNA-based diagnosis of hereditary and infectious diseases.