We report high-speed real-time PCR performed on an unmodified disposable polystyrene Petri dish. The reaction cycle relies solely on an infrared laser for heating; no conventional heater is required. Nanoliter droplets of PCR mixture as water-in-oil emulsions printed in an array format served as individual PCR microreactors. A simple contact printing technique was developed to generate a large ...

Genotyping of thiopurine S-methyltransferase (TPMT) is recommended for predicting the adverse drug response of thiopurines. In the current study, a novel version of allele-specific PCR (AS-PCR), termed competitive real-time fluorescent AS-PCR (CRAS-PCR) was developed to analyze the TPMT*2 genotype in ethnic Chinese. This technique simultaneously uses wild-type and mutant allele-specific scorpio...

BACKGROUND In the current study we present a validated miRNA signature to predict pathologic complete response (pCR) to neoadjuvant chemoradiation in esophageal adenocarcinoma. METHODS Three patient cohorts (discovery, n = 10; model, n = 43; and validation, n = 65) with locally advanced esophageal adenocarcinoma were analyzed. In the discovery cohort 754 miRNAs were examined in pretreatment t...

background: oct4b1, a novel variant of oct4, is expressed in cancer cell lines and tissues. based on our previous reports, oct4b1 appears to have a crucial role in regulating apoptosis as well as stress response [heat shock proteins (hsps)] pathways. the aim of the present study was to determine the effects of oct4b1 silencing on the expression of high molecular weight hsps in three different h...