Gel Beads & NoChipDrop Kit - RAN Biotech - Beverly, MA

Built for flexibility. Designed for discovery.

Our highly customizable gel beads are developed and optimized by a team of scientists and technologists to support a wide range of workflows. Every element, from size to functionality, can be tailored to align with your experimental goals.

Barcode beads available both off-the-shelf and custom-designed
Precise control over bead size to match your system requirements
Multiple physical formats, including magnetic, dissolvable, and fluorescent options
Compatible with chip-based and chip-free (Particle Templated Emulsification) workflows
Adaptable functionalization to capture your molecule of interest

Our beads integrate seamlessly into established platforms such as Drop-seq, inDrops, HyDrop, and single-cell RNA sequencing workflows, while also supporting the development of new approaches.

UniversalBeads™

RAN Biotech’s proprietary UniversalBeads™ technology enables in-lab functionalization of gel beads with your molecule of choice using widely adopted chemical strategies.

These beads are designed with versatile reactive groups, such as amine, DBCO, hydroxyl, and other custom functionalities, that readily couple with custom oligos and biomolecules bearing complementary chemistries (e.g., NHS, azide, hydroxyl).

UniversalBeads™ offer a flexible alternative for customers who prefer to perform their own functionalization, whether as an alternative to our off-the-shelf functionalized beads or to develop custom solutions beyond standard barcode bead formats.

This approach provides a flexible and controlled pathway to tailor bead functionality directly within your workflow.

Try functional gel beads in your NoChipDrop^TM kit

NoChipDrop™ kits:

The NoChipDrop™ kits include gel beads and emulsification oils optimized for efficient Particle Templated Emulsification (PTE); a chip-free droplet generation technique.

Cat# NoChipDrop-kit1:

Emulsion Oil – 500 μL
Aqueous Recovery Oil – 125 μL
Gel Bead Slurry – 350 μL (ca. 1.27M DummyBeads)

Cat# NoChipDrop-kit2:

Emulsion Oil – 2 mL
Aqueous Recovery Oil – 0.5 mL
Gel Bead Slurry – 1.4 mL (ca. 5.08M DummyBeads)”

Ask us for more details

Example Structures and Characteristics of RAN Biotech’s Gel Beads

RAN Biotech’s Barcode Beads in Literature

This Nature study introduces a single-cell platform for simultaneously capturing transcriptomic and CRISPR lineage information to study mammalian development and precancer. Custom multiomic hydrogel beads produced by RAN Biotechnologies were used in this work.

RAN Biotech’s gel beads are produced using proprietary methods and can be supplied with fluorescent or magnetic properties:

Newly introduced affordable barcode bead, RANscBead-X1: Barcode diversity (BD) 37k, DTT-dissolvable linker, polyT capture, diam. 71.5um in BLB (cat# RANscBead-X1-1M)
RANscBead-X2: TruSeq Integration, BD 1.8m, DTT-dissolvable linker, polyT capture, diam. 60um in FSLB (cat# RANscBead-X2-1M)
Dissolvable HyDrop polyT barcoded (Barcode diversity, BD ca. 885k) (cat# FGB-HyDrop-polyT-1M)
Dissolvable HyDrop scATAC barcoded (BD ca. 885k) beads (cat# FGB-HyDrop-ATAC-1M)
Photocleavable CustomSeqReady barcoded beads (inDrop variation, BD ca. 147k), include an adapter at the end of the barcodes for adding custom capturing sequences which can be done by the end user (we supply a protocol) (cat# CustomSeqReadyID-1M)
Dissolvable CustomSeqReady barcoded beads (HyDrop variation, BD ca. 885k), include an adapter at the end of the barcodes for adding custom capturing sequences which can be done by the end user (we supply a protocol) (cat# CustomSeqReadyHD-1M)
Photocleavable InDrop polyT barcoded (BD, ca. 147k) beads (cat# FGB-InDrop-polyT-1M)
Photocleavable InDrop polyT barcoded Superparamagnetic (BD ca. 147k) beads (cat# FGB-InDrop-Mag-polyT-1M)
Universal Beads (amine-terminated) (cat# UniversalBead-1M)
“Dummy” non-functionalized polyacrylamide beads (cat# DummyBead-1M)
DTT-dissolvable non-functionalized beads (cat# DissolvBead-1M)
Fluorescent polyacrylamide beads (cat# FluoreBead-1M)
Custom beads, the structure of which is provided by the client. We would be happy to provide an ordering form (includes dropdown menus for easy selections) to be filled out based on the desired specifications. A minimum ordering quantity applies.

UniversalBeads™

NoChipDrop™ kits:

Example Structures and Characteristics of RAN Biotech’s Gel Beads

RAN Biotech’s Barcode Beads in Literature

RAN Biotech’s gel beads are produced using proprietary methods and can be supplied with fluorescent or magnetic properties:

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