The Affymetrix GeneChip system is a commercial microarray platform that allows whole genome gene expression analysis for a wide variety of experimental organisms. This system has three major advantages over other array systems: it is easy to get rapid results; it has the capability to monitor the expression of every gene in the genome; and it is the most widely used commercial microarray platform.

Getting started with Affymetrix GeneChips is easy:

• Set-up an appointment with members of the Center to discuss your experiment. This is optional, but highly recommended.
• Give us total RNA (Standard processing is available starting with as little as 10 ng of total RNA. Exon arrays require 1 µg of total RNA)
• Wait 2 weeks for us to process your samples

The Affymetrix GeneChip Exon Array system provides, for the first time, exon-level expression profiling of the whole-genome on a single array. The arrays contain probes for over 1 million exon clusters within regions of the genome known or predicted to be transcribed. This new generation of GeneChip allows investigation of the expression of individual exons to analyze alternative splicing. Exon Array GeneChips are available for human, mouse, and rat.

Affymetrix GeneChip^TM System for Genotyping

The Affymetrix GeneChip system is a commercial microarray platform that allows high-throughput genotyping for human samples with as little as 250 ng of genomic DNA. The new Human SNP Array 6.0 offers the ability to determine over 900,000 SNP genotypes and interrogate over 900,000 copy number variable regions from a single genomic DNA sample.

Affymetrix GeneChip^TM CustomSeq^TM Resequencing Arrays

Affymetrix GeneChip CustomSeq Resequencing Arrays provides flexible custom arrays that are capable of determining up to 300 kb of unique, high-quality, double-stranded sequence. Flexible array formats of 50kb, 100kb, or 300kb are available. Sequences may cover a single contiguous region or multiple dispersed fragments, facilitating the analysis of whole genomes, multiple genes, and/or multiple organisms on a single array.

A Human Mitochondrial Resequencing array is available as a catalog product. The array interrogates the entire16 kb of the mitochondrial genome.

Affymetrix GeneChip^TM Whole Genome Tiling Arrays

The Affymetrix GeneChip Tiling Array Sets contain probes that cover virtually every base pair of the genome and are designed for identifying novel transcripts, mapping sites of protein/DNA interaction in chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) experiments, and other experiments. Probes are tiled at 5-35 base pair resolution, depending on the organism, as measured from the central position of adjacent 25-mer oligos. Array sets are available for a variety of organisms in several different configurations. The probes for interrogating each chromosome are contained on a single array from the whole genome array set and each array is available separately.

Please contact the Microarray Resource for more information and to discuss all projects involving Affymetrix GeneChip exon, genotyping, resequencing, or tiling arrays.