New Products

Labsystems Introduces Finnpipette Vacupette Nalge Unveils New Splash Shield MEGALON's ChemStructure For Windows IN/US Systems' GC-RAM Radio-GC Beta Detectors Make Debut The Nest Group Offers Nucleobond AX L-Kit The Finnpipette Vacupette, available from Labsystems of Needham Heights, Mass., is a vacuum pipettor for use in tissue-culturing techniques or in situations in which aspirating by vacuum suction is required. The Vacupette is designed to replace traditional glass pipettes. The user attaches a tube from the top of the pipette to a vacuum system. The liquid is aspirated by a disposable tip through the pipettor to a waste container. According to the manufacturer, the Vacupette reduces risk of contamination because the laboratory technician doesn't have to exit or enter the hood once the process is started. Moreover, tips are never handled by the technician and are discarded after each use. The Vacupette is designed to be autoclavable without any special preparation: The user removes the tip, detaches the tubing, and places it into the autoclave. The tip is placed on the Vacupette from a rack; the modified tip ejector allows the tip to be ejected without the vacuum being turned off. The Vacupette also offers a reduction in biohazardous waste, according to Labsystems, because the tips require less packaging and take less space when disposed of, compared with glass pipettes. The Vacupette uses standard 200-100 ml tips, which are more economical than glass pipettes. A new safety splash shield, available from Nalge Co. of Rochester, N.Y., offers researchers handling potentially infectious samples protection from accidental splashes, aerosols, and flying debris. According to the company, the shield also helps labs comply with Occupational Safety and Health Administration bloodborne-pathogen regulations. The 81/2 12-inch polycarbonate shield attaches to bench- tops, shelving, machinery, or other magnetic surfaces and features a flexible, 14-inch "gooseneck" arm. The arm moves freely and stays in place, leaving the front of the shield unobstructed for free lateral arm movement and easy manipulation of samples. A magnetic base lets users position the shield horizontally (flat), vertically, or on an overhead surface for maximal protection and minimal obstruction. A clamp mount is available for use in situations in which a magnetic surface is not available. The shield also provides UV protection from 200 to 360 nanometers. MEGALON of Neuchatel, Switzerland, has released ChemStructure, a drawing and presentation program for chemistry-related applications designed to run on Microsoft Windows. Offering drawing tools and a library of prebuilt graphics and chemical fragments, the software enables researchers to develop high-quality drawings of chemical and structural formulas, schematics, and equipment. According to the manufacturer, Chem-Structure is a true WYSIWYG ("what you see is what you get") program, displaying images on- screen as they will appear when printed or exported to other software programs--for example, for page layout, presentation, or word processing. The program also can be used as an interface to modeling programs, providing a drawing tool for creating starting structures as well as final, detailed presentations of modeled structures. IN/US Systems Inc. of Tampa Fla., has introduced GC-RAM, an online radioactivity quantitation system of 3H or 14C for gas chromatography. Its standard features include: a gas- proportional detector using standard P-10 gas, capable of quantitating as little as 5 Bq of radioactivity; a miniature reactor that eliminates heated transfer lines; mass flow controllers to permit high-precision gas flow; front-panel LED and LCD indicators of system status and flow rates; TTL output to computer interfacing; analog output for chart recording and chromatography data systems; and front-panel gas connections. Housed in a compact, stackable unit, the GC-RAM can be used with capillary gas chromatographs--packed columns or megabore. Carrier gas flow can range between 1 and 40 ml per minute. Also available for the GC-RAM is IN/US Systems' LabChrom software, a Windows application for computer evaluation of data from radiochromatography detectors. According to the manufacturer, Lab Chrom is a multiprogramming, multitasking system that provides simultaneous real-time collection, display, and analysis of GC-RAM and mass detector data. The Nest Group Inc. of Southborough, Mass., has made available its Nucleobond AX L-Kit for isolating lambda phage DNA. The kit is used for isolating undegraded, ultrapure lambda DNA from a lysate in less than four hours, without the need for DNAse I, RNAse A, or phenol. Lambda DNA appears as one sharp band on agarose gels (Lane 1) with no smearing from partial degradation and no genomic DNA bands (Lane 2). According to the company, the kit is recommended for even the most sensitive applications because of its high degree of purity, and has been used for restriction mapping, subcloning, amplification, and sequencing. Each kit is supplied with ready-to-use gravity-flow cartridges and buffers. Kits are also available for plasmid DNA purification. National Instruments, headquartered in Austin, Texas, recently released the 1994 version of its free DAQ Designer software. According to the company, the software reduces the complexity and time involved in configuring personal computer-based data-acquisition (DAQ) systems. DAQ Designer configures systems for PC, XT, AT, EISA, and Micro Channel- based computers, including laptop and notebook machines. The software also ensures that users have the right hardware and software for their applications. New products added to the 1994 DAQ Designer package include: LabWindows/CVI, an ANSI C-based instrumentation software package for Windows-based PCs; SpectrumWare, a dynamic digital signal analyzer that simplifies measurement of frequency response, power spectrum, amplitude spectrum, coherence, transient capture, cross spectrum, and THD; DAQCard-700, a data-acquisition interface designed for laptops with PCMCIA slots; and new SCXI modules. DAQ Designer requires DOS 3.0 or later, 80286 minimum processor, at least 640 KB RAM, and a VGA monitor.

New Products

The Scientist Staff

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