Presentation > Microarray analysis overview 1/2

Microarray Center - Microarray analysis Overview 1/2

Microarray experiment flowchart

DNA microarray analysis is a fast and versatile approach to achieve high throughput explorations of genome structure, gene expression program, and of gene function at both cellular and organism levels. A DNA microarray-based analysis is a complex multistep process involving numerous specific equipments, and requiring a strong expertise in various areas, including molecular biology, image analysis, computing, and statistics.

Microarrays are miniaturised biological devices consisting in molecules, for example DNA or protein, named the "probes", that are orderly arranged at a miscoscopic scale onto a solid support such as a membrane or a glass microscope slide. The array elements bind specifically to labelled molecules, the "targets", present in complex molecular mixtures, generating signals that reveal the identity and the concentration of the interacting labelled species. Microarray analysis has a broad range of applications that involve different types of probes and/or targets.



The most common application of DNA/oligonucleotide microarray is gene expression analysis. In this technique, RNA isolated from two samples are labelled with two different fluorochromes (generally the green cyanine 3 and the red cyanine 5 (Cy3, Cy5)) before being hybridised to a microarray consisting of large numbers of cDNAs/oligonucleotides orderly arranged onto a glass microscope slide. After hybridisation under stringent conditions, a scanner records, after excitation of the two fluorochromes at given wavelengths, the intensity of the fluorescence emission signals that is proportional to transcript levels in the biological samples. The microarray data are analysed using specific softwares that enables clustering of genes with similar expression patterns, assuming that they share common biological functions.


What step of the microarray-based analysis are you interested in? Click on any of the steps in the picture below for detailed informations.



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