Researchers at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genomics [WTCHG] at the University of Oxford have teamed up with Oxford-based microarray specialists OGT Services to develop an in situ spotting method for double-stranded d DNA on microarray slides.
<em>In situ</em> customised arrays developed in Oxford
The project began when Dr Irina Udalova (now at the Kennedy Institute, London) and Dr Ioannis Ragoussis (head of genomics at WTCHG) began pioneering work to establish binding profiles of human transcription factors using their in-house microarray system. Dr Ragoussis explained: "This is ground-breaking work and the sequences in question are particularly long, so we knew we would need a customised system. We also knew that OGT had the capability to synthesise long sequences directly on slides, and approached the company to explore ways to apply the methodology to our project. They put a considerable amount of effort into setting up and optimising the protocol for converting the synthesised single-stranded oligonucleotides into double-stranded DNA duplexes, which was essential for our project. Together, we
have had obtained some very good results and I think we have all learned a lot from the effort put in by both sides."