A microarray is a

multiplex Multiplex may refer to: * Multiplex (automobile), a former American car make * Multiplex (comics), a DC comic book supervillain * Multiplex (company), a global contracting and development company * Multiplex (assay), a biological assay which measu ...

lab-on-a-chip A lab-on-a-chip (LOC) is a device that integrates one or several laboratory functions on a single integrated circuit (commonly called a "chip") of only millimeters to a few square centimeters to achieve automation and high-throughput screening. ...

. Its purpose is to simultaneously detect the expression of thousands of genes from a sample (e.g. from a tissue). It is a two-dimensional array on a solid substrate—usually a

glass slide A microscope slide is a thin flat piece of glass, typically 75 by 26 mm (3 by 1 inches) and about 1 mm thick, used to hold objects for examination under a microscope. Typically the object is mounted (secured) on the slide, and then b ...

or silicon thin-film cell—that assays (tests) large amounts of biological material using

high-throughput screening High-throughput screening (HTS) is a method for scientific experimentation especially used in drug discovery and relevant to the fields of biology, materials science and chemistry. Using robotics, data processing/control software, liquid handling ...

miniaturized, multiplexed and parallel processing and detection methods. The concept and methodology of microarrays was first introduced and illustrated in

antibody microarray An antibody microarray (also known as antibody array) is a specific form of protein microarray. In this technology, a collection of captured antibodies are spotted and fixed on a solid surface such as glass, plastic, membrane, or silicon chip, and ...

s (also referred to as

antibody matrix An antibody microarray (also known as antibody array) is a specific form of protein microarray. In this technology, a collection of captured antibodies are spotted and fixed on a solid surface such as glass, plastic, membrane, or silicon chip, and ...

) by Tse Wen Chang in 1983 in a scientific publication and a series of patents. The "

gene chip A DNA microarray (also commonly known as DNA chip or biochip) is a collection of microscopic DNA spots attached to a solid surface. Scientists use DNA microarrays to measure the expression levels of large numbers of genes simultaneously or to ...

" industry started to grow significantly after the 1995 ''

Science Magazine ''Science'', also widely referred to as ''Science Magazine'', is the peer-reviewed academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and one of the world's top academic journals. It was first published in 1880, ...

'' article by the Ron Davis and Pat Brown labs at Stanford University. With the establishment of companies, such as Affymetrix,

Agilent Agilent Technologies, Inc. is an American life sciences company that provides instruments, software, services, and consumables for the entire laboratory workflow. Its global headquarters is located in Santa Clara, California. Agilent was establi ...

, Applied Microarrays, Arrayjet, Illumina, and others, the technology of DNA microarrays has become the most sophisticated and the most widely used, while the use of protein, peptide and carbohydrate microarrays is expanding. Types of microarrays include: * DNA microarrays, such as cDNA microarrays, oligonucleotide microarrays, BAC microarrays and SNP microarrays *

MMChip MicroRNA (miRNA) are small, single-stranded, non-coding RNA molecules containing 21 to 23 nucleotides. Found in plants, animals and some viruses, miRNAs are involved in RNA silencing and post-transcriptional regulation of gene expression. miR ...

s, for surveillance of microRNA populations *

Protein microarray A protein microarray (or protein chip) is a high-throughput method used to track the interactions and activities of proteins, and to determine their function, and determining function on a large scale. Its main advantage lies in the fact that larg ...

s *

Peptide microarray A peptide microarray (also commonly known as peptide chip or peptide epitope microarray) is a collection of peptides displayed on a solid surface, usually a glass or plastic chip. Peptide chips are used by scientists in biology, medicine and pharm ...

s, for detailed analyses or optimization of

protein–protein interaction Protein–protein interactions (PPIs) are physical contacts of high specificity established between two or more protein molecules as a result of biochemical events steered by interactions that include electrostatic forces, hydrogen bonding and th ...

s *

Tissue microarray Tissue microarrays (also TMAs) consist of paraffin blocks in which up to 1000 separate tissue cores are assembled in array fashion to allow multiplex histological analysis. History The major limitations in molecular clinical analysis of tiss ...

s *

Cellular microarray A cellular microarray (or cell microarray) is a laboratory tool that allows for the multiplex interrogation of living cells on the surface of a solid support. The support, sometimes called a "chip", is spotted with varying materials, such as antib ...

s (also called transfection microarrays) *

Chemical compound microarray A chemical compound microarray is a collection of organic chemical compounds spotted on a solid surface, such as glass and plastic. This microarray format is very similar to DNA microarray, protein microarray and antibody microarray. In chemical gen ...

s *

Antibody microarray An antibody microarray (also known as antibody array) is a specific form of protein microarray. In this technology, a collection of captured antibodies are spotted and fixed on a solid surface such as glass, plastic, membrane, or silicon chip, and ...

s *

Glycan array Glycan arrays, like that offered by the Consortium for Functional Glycomics (CFG), National Center for Functional Glycomics (NCFG) anZ Biotech, LLC contain carbohydrate compounds that can be screened with lectins, antibodies or cell receptors to de ...

s (carbohydrate arrays) * Phenotype microarrays *

Reverse phase protein lysate microarray A reverse phase protein lysate microarray (RPMA) is a protein microarray designed as a dot-blot platform that allows measurement of protein expression levels in a large number of biological samples simultaneously in a quantitative manner when hig ...

s, microarrays of lysates or serum * Interferometric reflectance imaging sensor (

IRIS Iris most often refers to: *Iris (anatomy), part of the eye *Iris (mythology), a Greek goddess * ''Iris'' (plant), a genus of flowering plants * Iris (color), an ambiguous color term Iris or IRIS may also refer to: Arts and media Fictional ent ...

) People in the field of CMOS biotechnology are developing new kinds of microarrays. Once fed

magnetic nanoparticles Magnetic nanoparticles are a class of nanoparticle that can be manipulated using magnetic fields. Such particles commonly consist of two components, a magnetic material, often iron, nickel and cobalt, and a chemical component that has functionali ...

, individual cells can be moved independently and simultaneously on a microarray of magnetic coils. A microarray of

nuclear magnetic resonance Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is a physical phenomenon in which nuclei in a strong constant magnetic field are perturbed by a weak oscillating magnetic field (in the near field) and respond by producing an electromagnetic signal with a ...

microcoils is under development.

Fabrication and operation of microarrays

A large number of technologies underlie the microarray platform, including the material substrates, spotting of biomolecular arrays, and the microfluidic packaging of the arrays. Microarrays can be categorized by how they physically isolate each element of the array, by spotting (making small physical wells), on-chip synthesis (synthesizing the target DNA probes adhered directly on the array), or bead-based (adhering samples to barcoded beads randomly distributed across the array).

Notes

{{Authority control

Fabrication and operation of microarrays

See also

Notes