The need for transparency and good practices in the qPCR literature

Bustin, S. A., Benes, V., Garson, J., Hellemans, J., Huggett, J., Kubista, M., Mueller, R., Nolan, T., Pfaffl, M. W., Shipley, G., Wittwer, C. T., Schjerling, P., Day, P. J., Abreu, M., Aguado, B., Beaulieu, J. F., Beckers, A., Bogaert, S., Browne, J. A., Carrasco-Ramiro, F., Ceelen, L., Ciborowski, K., Cornillie, P., Coulon, S., Cuypers, A., De Brouwer, S., De Ceuninck, L., De Craene, J., De Naeyer, H., De Spiegelaere, W., Deckers, K., Dheedene, A., Durinck, K., Ferreira-Teixeira, M., Fieuw, A., Gallup, J. M., Gonzalo-Flores, S., Goossens, K., Heindryckx, F., Herring, E., Hoenicka, H., Icardi, L., Jaggi, R., Javad, F., Karampelias, M., Kibenge, F., Kibenge, M., Kumps, C., Lambertz, I., Lammens, T., Markey, A., Messiaen, P., Mets, E., Morais, S., Mudarra-Rubio, A., Nakiwala, J., Nelis, H., Olsvik, P. A., Perez-Novo, C., Plusquin, M., Remans, T., Rihani, A., Rodrigues-Santos, P., Rondou, P., Sanders, R., Schmidt-Bleek, K., Skovgaard, K., Smeets, K., Tabera, L., Toegel, S., Van Acker, T., Van den Broeck, W., Van der Meulen, J., Van Gele, M., Van Peer, G., Van Poucke, M., Van Roy, N., Vergult, S., Wauman, J., Tshuikina-Wiklander, M., Willems, E., Zaccara, S., Zeka, F., Vandesompele, J. The need for transparency and good practices in the qPCR literature. Nature Methods, 10: 1063–1067, 2013. ISSN 1548-7091.

Abstract

Two surveys of over 1,700 publications whose authors use quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) reveal a lack of transparent and comprehensive reporting of essential technical information. Reporting standards are significantly improved in publications that cite the Minimum Information for Publication of Quantitative Real-Time PCR Experiments (MIQE) guidelines, although such publications are still vastly outnumbered by those that do not.