Agilent Technologies has introduced the Sureselect Kinome Target Enrichment Kit, enabling researchers to focus next-generation sequencing studies on expressed kinases (the kinome).
The assay, developed with Dr Rene Bernards of the Netherlands Cancer Institute, Antoni van Leeuwenhoek Hospital, targets genes for greater than 500 known kinases, plus a number of cancer genes and untranslated regions.
'Being able to target approximately 500 kinase genes simultaneously provides us with a significant advantage to link kinase mutations with disease states with the potential to individualise therapy for each cancer patient,' said Bernards.
'Using the knowledge gained from our Sureselect studies, we could better stratify patient populations for specific targeted therapies,' he said.
'With the human kinome kit we focus our research specifically on kinases, as mutations in these genes are frequently strong biomarkers of response to targeted cancer therapies,' Bernards said.
'By focusing on a limited set of genes, we can maximise our sequencing depth and reduce overall sequencing expense,' he added.
'The kit will enable scientists to efficiently map mutations across the genome, accelerate biomarker discovery and allow for better stratification of patient populations,' said Emily LeProust, Agilent director, applications and chemistry research and development, genomics.
The Sureselect Kinome Target Enrichment Kit is based on the Agilent Sureselect platform, which streamlines experiments by sequencing only the genomic region of interest.
The system offers a range of target enrichment products and highly optimised protocols for a diverse set of sequencing methods and platforms.
Sureselect products are available for enrichment of target sizes ranging from smaller than 200Kb to more than 50Mb in a single tube.
Protocols now support Illumina end sequencing, paired-end sequencing and indexing protocols in addition to fragment library format, paired-end sequencing and barcoding on the Solid System.
Users of Agilent's eArray xD desktop design tool can improve the efficiency of their research by easily designing custom products to target any genome of interest, all in a single tube.
Agilent also offers the eArray online design tool, enabling users to customise predefined Sureselect kits such as the Sureselect Human All Exon series of products.
The Sureselect products also are highly automated through robotics systems from Agilent.
