Commercial Kit Enables Rapid Assessment of Chromatin Structure

A commercial kit is now available that enables the rapid quantitative assessment of chromatin structure by quantitatively differentiating expressed (accessible) and silent (inaccessible) regions of the genome.

The Bio-Rad Laboratories (Hercules, CA, USA) EpiQ chromatin analysis kit was designed to complement existing epigenetic assays such as DNA methylation and chromatin immunoprecipitation. These measurements detect whether epigenetic processes such as DNA methylation or histone modification have caused changes in gene expression.


The EpiQ chromatin analysis kit was designed to differentiate between genes that are being actively transcribed (euchromatin) and silent genes (heterochromatin). The selective nuclease provided in the kit can only act on euchromatin. The difference in the amount of DNA detected by the kit's PCR reagents before and after nuclease digestion reveals the extent to which the target gene is expressed.

The EpiQ kit includes buffers for cell permeabilization and in situ chromatin digestion, optimized nuclease, materials for genomic DNA purification, control assays (qPCR primers) for chromatin assessment of a reference (epigenetically silenced) and control (constitutively expressed) gene, and EpiQ Chromatin SYBR Green Supermix, a real-time PCR reagent designed to amplify genomic DNA.

The EpiQ kit permits assessment of chromatin structure in as few as 50,000 cultured cells within six hours, and it can generate quantitative chromatin structure information for multiple genomic elements.

"The EpiQ chromatin analysis kit provides researchers with an easy and fast way to quantify a gene's chromatin state,” said Viresh Patel, marketing manager for PCR reagents at Bio-Rad. "Using the kit, cancer, developmental, and stem cell biology researchers are able to glean direct information regarding the chromatin state that is associated with epigenetic marks such as DNA methylation and histone modifications for the first time."

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