101 things you (maybe) didn’t know about MacVector: #21 – MacVector Free

MacVector Free is a version on MacVector that provides many of MacVector’s most popular functions completely free of charge. This is a new feature of MacVector that we introduced with the latest MacVector 12.7 version. Here’s how to get it – simply register for the fully functional 21-day time-limited trial version and install the trial license that we will e-mail to you. After the 21-day trial period expires, you can still continue to use MacVector, but with reduced functionality. However, you can still accomplish many common molecular biological manipulations with MacVector Free, for example;

• All of the file opening, saving and printing functions are active so you can use MacVector to convert between file formats and open sequences and alignments in any format supported by MacVector.

• All of the feature creation and editing tools are functional, including the tools for changing the graphical appearance of features so you can customize your sequence to create gorgeous plasmid maps and copy those into other graphics applications or print them out with high resolution.

• The automatic restriction enzyme searching and digest/ligate “Click Cloning” functions are active. This means you can create and document new constructs by simply clicking on restriction enzyme sites and copying and pasting into vectors. This also works for documenting simple Gateway recombinational cloning constructs.

• All of the basic editing capabilities are active in the Multiple Sequence Alignment and Align To Reference windows. You can’t run the automatic alignment tools, but you can manually tweak and print alignments sent to you by colleagues or imported from other formats.

• The Internet Entrez and BLAST functions are available and fully functional.

Obviously, there are many advanced features that are not available in MacVector Free, but if you have relatively simple needs, MacVector Free is a great way of keeping track of constructs you’ve made in the lab and for preparing high quality maps for lab meetings. If you are a regular MacVector user, you can send MacVector files to collaborators who do not have MacVector and point them to MacVector Free so that they can open, view, edit, print and save the files in any format they wish.

For more details of the functionality included in MacVector Free, please follow this link.

This is an article in a long running series of tips to help you get the most out of MacVector. If you want to get notified every time a new tip gets published, follow us @MacVector on twitter (or check the feed for the hashtag #101MacVectorTips) or like us on Facebook.

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