I worry that sending out 130 applications means that you are not carefully researching the projects and research goals of each lab so that you can tailor each application and cover letter to the position you desire. Lab work requires attention to detail. Right now, that detail is all about what each lab is working on. If you are applying to a university lab, read their most recent publications before writing your cover letter.
To paraphrase, "It's not what the lab can do for you, it's what you can do for the lab."
We all know that you will gain experience and skills if you get the job. Your application should concentrate on why someone should hire you. Your application must persuade the person screening a flood of applications that you have something to contribute. It takes a lot of time to train an intern or entry level person.

Here is an article from the biospace website.
Where the Jobs are: Siemens (SI) is Hiring College-Level Students Interested in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math to Fill Over 400 Internship Positions Across the Country


4/6/2012 10:13:50 AM



WASHIGNTON, April 6, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Siemens is hiring over 400 college-level students to join its Summer Intern Program across the Energy, Infrastructure and Cities, Industry and Healthcare sectors. At the end of each summer, Siemens recruits top performing interns from its program to become full-time employees.
(Logo: http://photos.prnews...904/SIEMENSLOGO )
The Siemens Summer Intern Program lasts three months and offers college-level students the opportunity to learn about Siemens businesses first-hand and cultivate essential career development tools through mentorship and networking opportunities.
"Siemens is committed to developing talent, both for our existing employees and by identifying and nurturing new entry level talent. We offer multiple internship programs across our businesses with a goal of converting the best candidates to full-time employees once they graduate," said Mike Panigel, Chief Human Resources Officer for Siemens in the Americas. "Through this program we have an opportunity to get to know the candidates and they get to know Siemens it enables all of us to make informed hiring decisions. The fresh ideas and enthusiasm of these new recruits are critical to the sustainability of the organization."
Internship positions primarily focus on the following areas: Engineering, Finance, IT, Marketing, Operations, Procurements and Sales. Siemens is specifically looking for students with education or experience in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) to match well with its portfolio of high-tech products and solutions, including green building design, renewable energy, healthcare and mobility.
Each year, Siemens holds recruiting events at college and university campuses across the country. Interested students are encouraged to find more information on internship programs and apply online at: usa.siemens.com/careers/students
About Siemens
Siemens Corporation is a U.S. subsidiary of Siemens AG, a global powerhouse in electronics and electrical engineering, operating in the industry, energy, healthcare, infrastructure and cities sectors. For more than 160 years, Siemens has built a reputation for leading-edge innovation and the quality of its products, services and solutions. Siemens in the USA reported revenue of around $20 billion and employs approximately 60,000 people throughout all 50 states and Puerto Rico. For more information on Siemens in the United States, visit www.usa.siemens.com.
SOURCE Siemens Corporation



Read at BioSpace.com

Listed details look good. Check careers section of biospace.com for more advice.

These days, ads for entry level positions result in a flood of applications from newbies as well as people with PhDs. Entry level will usually not pay for travel costs to an interview or relocation costs. The employer may be concentrating on the local talent pool as a result. Experience as an intern or tech in the lab of one of your professors is a plus, but not usually required. The positive side of this is that it would presumably take less time to train you.
The disadvantage of only having classroom lab experience is that you have only performed things once or twice. On the other hand, you probably haven't picked up any bad habits.

Taq polymerase is quite stable at room temperature for six months providing it isn't opened! If it is repeatedly opened you stand a very good chance of culturing some nice airborne bacterial or fungal contamination in the 50% glycerol storage buffer.
(Duncan Clark, DNAmp Ltd. (Licensed PCR enzyme manufacturer) on 03.08.96 at http://www.bio.net/bionet/mm/methods/1994-...ber/019005.html)

The idea of molar ratio is based on the fact that you want an equal number of ends of the two (or more) DNA fragments, regardless of whether one is the vector. The old 3:1 ratio (for ng of DNA fragments) was developed when most inserts were 1 kb and the vector was around 3 kb.
For molar ratio, you want a 1:1 mix of DNA fragments.

To estimate the frequency of colonies with the correct insert, 10 µL samples from 10 to 20 cultures can be PCR amplified according to a procedure for amplification of bacterial colonies (D. Gussow and T. Clackson, Nucleic Acids Res. 17 4000 (1989)), using the forward and reverse sequencing primers. Colony PCR initiated from transformation reactions can give rise to false positives if the primers anneal to the insert sequence due to excess DNA insert from the ligation reaction that is spread as part of the transformation reaction onto bacterial plates(Qing Dallas-Yang, Guogiang Jiang and Frances M. Sladek, 1998. Avoiding false positives in colony PCR. BioTechniques 24 (4) 580-582). Typical ligation protocols utilize 5 pmol of insert PCR product in a 20 µL reaction (0.25 pmol/µL) with 0.5 pmols of vector. Assuming that all the vectors acquire a single copy of insert, 4.5 pmols (0.225 pmol/µL) of excess insert remain in the ligation reaction. 2 µL of a 1:5 dilution of the ligation reaction (0.09 pmol) is electroporated and diluted 1:9 with SOC media (0.01 pmol/µL). If 100 µL (1.0 pmol) is spread on a 55.4 cm2 plate (0.018 pmol/mm2) and a 4 mm2 agar pick is used, then 0.072 pmols (4.35 e 10 molecules) of background insert are available for a 100 µL colony PCR assay. To avoid this problem, at least one primer should anneal to the vector. Use of the Forward and Reverse Sequencing primers is recommended, as this allows the determination of double inserts or vector-only colonies. A negative control consisting of vector-only is also recommended for purposes of band identification. [/font]

Taq does not always add an A to the 3' end of the PCR product.
Hu, 1993 DNA and Cell Biology 12 (8) 763-770.
D. Denney, Jr. and I. Weissman 1990 Amplifications 4: 25-26.
V.L. Magnuson, D.S. Ally, S.J. Nylund, Z.E. Karanjawala, A.L. Lowe, S. Gough and F.S. Collins, 1996 Substrate nucleotide-determined non-templated addition of adenine by Taq DNA polymerase: implications afor PCR-based genotyping and cloning. Nucleic Acids Res. 21:700-709.
Hite, J., Eckert, K. A., Cheng K. C., 1996. Factors affecting fidelity of DNA synthesis during PCR amplification of d(C-A)nd(G-T)n microsatelite repeats. Nucleic Acid Res. 24: 2429-2434.
Costa and Weiner, 1994 NAR 22 (12) 2423.)
J. M. Brownstein, J. D. Carptena and J. R. Smith 1996 BioTechniques 20: 1004-1010.