2 TYPES OF CENTRIFUGES:

• Floor Standing — ideal for very high daily volumes or applications requiring very high G-force speeds. Supports a wide range of rotors. Holds from 1.5 to 1000ml samples (depending on rotor).
• Benchtop — ideal for lower volumes, lower speed applications and can be conveniently placed around the lab. They are more economical than floor models, but they hold fewer samples and have lower speeds. General purpose centrifuges are the most common. Rotors may or may not be interchangeable, depending on the unit.

8 SPEED RANGES:

• Ultra-speed: up to 1,000,000 x g. Fastest centrifuges on the market with a vast range of rotor configurations. Typical sample volumes range from 0.23 ml to 250ml. Applications include working with DNA, protein or RNA fractionation or lipoprotein flotation, size gradient separations and many new nanotechnology applications.
• Super-speed: up to 70,000 x g. Second highest g-force centrifuges available. Typically offer a large volume range of 1.5ml to 1000ml. Wide range of rotors available for this centrifuge. Applications include general preparative work such as cell separations, tissue culture, isolations of Golgi bodies and ribosomes, DNA/RNA separations and plasmid preps.
• High-speed benchtop: up to 50,000 x g. Typical volume range between 1.5ml to 200ml. Not many rotor options available. Consider this model if you would prefer a benchtop model instead of a floor model for high speeds. Applications include whole cell harvesting or certain DNA/RNA applications.
• General purpose: up to 24,000 x g. The most common lab centrifuge. Typical volumes from 0.2ml to 750ml. A single unit can be modified through a large selection of rotors to suit many diverse applications. Applications include DNA/RNA research, cell harvesting, tissue culture, protein work and sub cellular separations.
• Microcentrifuge: up to 21,000 x g. These centrifuges are tailored for 0.2ml PCR tubes and 1.5 or 2.0ml microcentrifuge tubes. Applications include daily DNA and RNA work, plasmids and mini preparation kits.
• Low-speed: 7,000 x g. Typically used in the separation of whole cells or the whole cell harvest step when processing cultures from bioreactors. Only a small choice of rotors available, typically holding 1.5ml to 2000ml.
• Clinical: 3,000 x g or lower for 3 to 15ml samples. Most often used on a daily basis in clinical labs and hospitals. A typical run can process between 4 to 28 tubes. Applications include spinning blood collection tubes and urine samples at very low speeds for diagnostics.
• Cell-washer: 1,500 x g for 3 and 5ml samples. Very specialized centrifuges for washing blood cells for antigloboulin reagent tests, such as SBO compatibility, Rh testing, cross matching and the Coombs procedure. Typically support culture tubes in 3ml and 5ml volumes. Applications include washing away cellular debris, extraneous proteins and other constituents of the donor blood from red blood cells.

 What to look for:

• Lid safety locking.
• Automatic load balancing.
• AUTO-LOCK™ rotor system to change rotors in 3 seconds without tools.
• ClickSeal™ lids for biocontainment protection.
• Easy-to-clean features.
• Quick cool-down rates for refrigerated models.

NOTES:

• Centrifuges use different rotors for different applications. Adapters can be used with rotors to accommodate different size vessels, tubes, microtubes, plates, etc.
• The number of rotors and/or adapters available will depend on the centrifuge.
• Rotors and adapters are usually sold separately, although some centrifuges can be purchased in kits that come with one or more rotors and adapters.