Designing and documenting cloning strategies

Designing cloning strategies is easy with the Cloning Clipboard. You can perform quite complex ligations by simply dragging compatible ends together. However, when you open this construct a year later, you don’t want to have to look back in your lab book to know how you generated it. Neither do you need to! MacVector fully […]

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Calculating the PCR annealing temperature for a pair of primers

MacVector not only calculates the melting temperature (Tm) for any primers you design, but also displays the recommended annealing temperature (Ta) that you should use in PCR experiments using those primers. You can access the main MacVector interface for designing pairs of primers using Analyze | Primer Design (Primer3). From here you can ask MacVector […]

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Using the Primer Database to store your lab’s collection of primers

MacVector 14 saw the introduction of the new Primer Database tool. This allows you to save and retrieve primers from the Primer Database from the Primer3 and Quicktest Primer tools. You can also scan sequences for potential primer binding sites. The tool comes with a starter database of primers, but you can use existing subsequence […]

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Calculating the melting temperature of PCR primers

Calculating an accurate melting temperature of your oligos, your template and of the predicted product is important to set the cycling parameters of your PCR machine. To test a pair of primers, use Primer Design (Primer3). Open your template sequence Run ANALYZE > PRIMER DESIGN/TEST (Pairs) Click on the Use This Primer checkbox for both […]

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Testing pairs of PCR primer

Over the past few releases of MacVector, we have changed primer testing considerably. Now all primer design and testing can be done using Quicktest Primer for a single primer and Primer Design (Primer3) for pairs of primers. If you want to test an existing pair of primers for suitability, use the following steps: Open the […]

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Quickly design a pair of primers to amplify a feature

Designing a pair of primers to amplify a single feature is pretty quick with MacVector. Select a feature in the MAP tab. Run Primer Design/Test(Pairs). Ensure the dropdown menu is set to AMPLIFY FEATURE. Click OK. Check the summary shows that primers have been found and select the spreadsheet and graphical view. Click OK.

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MacVector for Windows: update.

It’s quite a few months since the last update on the development of MacVector for Windows. Work is progressing very well and a lot of the underlying functionality is now finished. The Cloning Clipboard, Restriction Enzyme analysis and QuickTest Primer tools are all done. The release is still some time away, but if you are […]

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Using the Primer Database to store your lab’s collection of primers

MacVector now directly supports storing primers within a primer database. The Primer Database tool allows you to save and retrieve primers from subsequence files within Primer3 and Quicktest Primer. You can easily create your own primer database, use existing files or import primers from Excel. Many users use subsequence files to store primers, and in […]

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MacVector Cloning Edition

Does your lab only need a simple DNA analysis application that will help you design primers and cloning experiments? Has your budget been cut to the bone? If the answer is a resounding “yes”, then we’ve released a new version of MacVector just for you. MacVector Cloning Edition provides all of the functionality you need […]

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How to quickly design primers to amplify a feature on your sequence

To design a pair of primers to amplify a single feature is pretty quick with MacVector. Select a feature in the MAP tab Run Primer Design (Primer3) Ensure the dropdown menu is set to AMPLIFY FEATURE Click OK Check the summary shows that primers have been found and select the spreadsheet and graphical view Click […]

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