Invitrogen Corporation (NASDAQ:IVGN), a provider of essential life science technologies for research, production and diagnostics, today announced the introduction of a new benchtop instrument, Countess(TM) automated cell counter, which offers a new method of automated cell counting to replace manual cell counting using a glass hemocytometer.

“This instrument was designed with the scientists’ workflows in mind, and adds to Invitrogen’s already productive line of benchtop instruments, as well as the full line of reagents to support those instruments,” said August Sick, General Manager and Vice President of Invitrogen’s Cellular Analysis Business Unit. “The Countess automates a very tedious and subjective manual process and gives accurate, repeatable results, freeing scientists to concentrate their efforts on the outcomes rather than the process.”

Currently, researchers use a glass slide with a grid pattern, count cells one by one, add the number of cells in each box and multiply that number by a dilution factor to calculate the final concentration of cells. The Countess automates this process, completing all counts and calculations in approximately 30 seconds.

The Countess(TM) instrument:

— Counts live and dead cells

— Calculates percent viability

— Measures average cell size

— Calculates dilutions for downstream applications

— Uses just 10 microliters of sample

For more information about the instrument and related reagents visit www.invitrogen.com/countess.

Invitrogen also currently offers the Qubit(TM) Quantitation System, for the quantitation of DNA, RNA and protein samples, the iPrep(TM) Purification Instrument for the purification of DNA and RNA, and the iBlot(R) for the transfer of proteins in the Western Blotting process.

Invitrogen Corporation was also recently cited by The Patent Board as the second leading company for science strength in its Patent Scorecard for Biotechnology.