The information below provides detailed support on data retrieval issues. If you are looking for trouble shooting information (e.g. because you are unhappy with your results), please go to our trouble shooting area. Should you not find the answer to your question/problem here, please contact us and we will do our best to help.

Notification emails...

When we have processed your samples and the results are ready, you will receive an email from us informing you that you have results. Hence, it is important that the email address you supply when submitting sample information is one that you check regularly. The subject line of the email contains a reference to the name of the archive that contains the data (see below) and might also contain more information depending on whether there have been problems with the samples or whether they are repeats. Please take the time to look at this information, since it will help you interpret the results.

Using our on-line system...

The easiest method for customers to obtain their sequencing results is by accessing them on-line via this web site. This method is fast and simple, enabling us to process samples as quickly as possible and to keep prices down. In order to access your results on-line you need a "Customer Account Number", "Username" and "Password", which you will enter during the logging-in process (performed using the "Sign In" box on the left of each page). Customers must have registered and received their account details before sending any samples and so will have these details available when they wish to retrieve their results. Please note that all data for a customer account (defined as a group of people working under the direction of a lab head / supervisor) is stored in a single results area. Hence, you will see and have access to data generated by other people in your account group in addition to your own data.

Results Archives...

In your account results area (see above) you will find folders arranged by year and month containing archive files, each of which contains results from a single sequencing run. These files are identified by the run number and date on which the sequence was generated and end with ".zip" file extension (note: previously, we used a different compression application that generated ".sit" files). You can download the archives by simply clicking on them. Your web browser will then download the archive and should open your chosen application for decoding ".zip" files (see below).

To check whether your system can cope with ".zip" files, you can click on this link. If your computer does not download a test archive and then decode it into a "test" folder containing a "Readme" file, you will have to set the preferences for your web browser and/or obtain an application that will handle the ".zip" files. "zip" archives are standard for Windows PCs. Macintosh computer users should also be able to handle these without any special software. However, if you cannot extract the files, there are various software solutions, including Zipeg (a free Mac and Windows zip extractor) and Stuffit Expander (also free, but you have to register on their site).

For the older (".sit") archives that we used, there is a version of Stuffit Expander that is available on this server for PC platforms. However, more recent versions are also available from the Aladdin Systems web site. Please go to our download area to get hold of this application. Note that you do not have to pay for these applications so long as you only want to use the expander part of the application. Follow the instructions in the installer and select only the expander part. You will then have a fully functional, non-demo version of the expander application installed. Mac OSX, Linux and DOS users, please follow the Aladdin Systems link in the download area to obtain a copy of Stuffit Expander for these platforms. If you need help configuring your system, please contact your system administrator; we are not responsible for assisting with IT-related issues that are not under our control.

Results archive contents...

Once you have decoded the archive, you will obtain a "run folder". In this folder you will find the individual chromatogram files (.ab1) and ASCII text files (.seq) together with a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet (.xls). The Excel spreadsheet will allow you to identify which of your samples is which. All these files can be opened by the appropriate applications (for chromatogram viewers, please visit our useful links page).

The samples are named like this: "27_030.ab1". The "27" bit corresponds to the sample number that is shown on the Excel spreadsheet. The second number (in the example above, "030") is the capillary number. We apologise if this is confusing, but we need to have the capillary number displayed to help with trouble shooting problems. The reason why the sample and capillary numbers are not the same is a historical thing... please don't ask.

Below are examples of what the content of user areas and results folders looks like:

Please click on an image to see it at full size.

Other ways to get results...

Please do not ask for these methods of obtaining your results unless absolutely necessary. Our on-line data retrieval system is far more convenient and simple. However, for customers who guenuinely cannot use the on-line system, we can email the ASCII files and the Excel spreadsheet. Please note that we do not supply print-outs routinely, since it is slow and costly and should not be necessary! Please also note that we will not email the chromatogram files, since they are too big. This option should only be used by customers who do not have access to http services and/or cannot configure their computer to retrieve and expand the archive files. If you do not have administrator rights on your PC and cannot install the necessary programs, please get your system adminstrator to install the programs. It will be worth it!

Data Storage

All sequence data is kept for a minimum period of six months from the date on which it was generated, then it may be destroyed to conserve hard disk space. Customers wishing data to be stored for longer than this should enquire about the feasibility of this. There may be a charge levied for this.