Quantabio Advances Newborn Screening and Emerging Applications by Streamlining DNA Extraction From Dried Blood Spot Samples
Quantabio, announced the launch of the sparQ™ Lysis Kit. This product is the latest addition to the company’s comprehensive newborn screening workflow for sequencing dried blood spots. Quantabio will showcase the full sparQ DBS-seq workflow, which includes lysis, library preparation and quantification, in booth #406 at the 2025 Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) Newborn Screening Symposium next week in Providence, R.I.
“With SSI’s comprehensive newborn screening workflow, maximizing yield from every sample is critical for performing follow-up assays when needed,” said Caroline Mentzel, PhD, Sequencing Scientist in the Department of Congenital Disorders at Statens Serum Institut. “The Quantabio sparQ Lysis Kit integrated seamlessly into our automated liquid handling system and has consistently delivered reliable results for our bead-based extraction method, even from very small sample quantities.”
Extracting genomic DNA from the dried blood spot samples collected from newborns can be challenging due to limited sample volume, potential DNA degradation and the presence of inhibitors from the blood matrix and filter paper. These factors often reduce both the yield and quality of DNA, compromising the accuracy and reliability of downstream genetic analyses. The new sparQ Lysis Kit addresses these challenges with advanced chemistry, allowing rapid and efficient extraction of double-stranded genomic DNA (dsDNA) from a limited number of standard blood spot punches in less than 50 minutes. The kit’s modular design minimizes hands-on time and integrates seamlessly into automated and high-throughput workflows. In cases where the newborn screen is positive for an inherited disease, the sparQ Lysis Kit may be used to isolate double-stranded DNA from adult whole blood for further trio testing.
The fast, cost-effective kit also supports a range of diverse sample types and can be applied in emerging applications where double-stranded DNA is required for next-generation sequencing, qPCR, digital PCR and other downstream analyses. Early customer validations have demonstrated consistent, reproducible performance across diverse blood spot qualities and storage conditions.
“The sparQ Lysis Kit is a significant improvement over any other method we’ve tried for processing dried blood spots for our cattle genotyping operation,” Stephanie Barnes, PhD, Associate Genetics Scientist at the J.R. Simplot Company. “The protocol is extremely streamlined and easy to use in higher-throughput 96-well plates, all with minimal waste. The samples we prepared using this kit gave us some of the cleanest sequencing data we’ve ever generated.”
“The idea for the sparQ Lysis technology was born out of conversations with our public health laboratory customers, who needed a faster, more efficient way to isolate dsDNA from newborn heel-prick blood samples for high-throughput whole-genome sequencing,” said Heather Meehan, PhD, General Manager of Quantabio. “With this new kit, we’re able to provide a fully integrated, scalable and cost-effective workflow that reduces hands-on time while delivering the high-quality data essential for newborn screening and other emerging dsDNA applications."
