Illumina released new sample prep protocol guidelines for generating mate pair libraries with its Nextera kit, and we’re pleased to report that the Pippin platform is the recommended choice for automated size selection.
You can check out the Nextera Mate Pair Sample Preparation Guide here . (We’re under Size Selection in Chapter 3, beginning on page 40 of the Guide.)
Illumina says that using an extra size selection step offers “more stringent” sizing than AMPure alone and lets users make libraries with larger fragments and more precise distribution than a gel-free approach. While the company has validated a manual approach in addition to the Pippin platform, Illumina’s guidelines note that “in our experience running a standard agarose gel does not provide as robust and reproducible results as the Sage Pippin Prep.”
In the user document, Illumina recommends the Pippin Prep with the 0.75% cassette and “eluting fragments with a broad range of sizes, of 3 to 6 kb in width, increasing in width with increasing fragment length (e.g. 2–5 kb, 4–8 kb or 6–12 kb).”
For current Pippin users, we would like to add that you can also use the 0.75% agarose dye-free cassette (BLF7510) with the BluePippin for equivalent results.