Gel Electrophoresis – Various

Overview

The BI houses various equipment to support gel electrophoresis separation of small molecules:

Horizontal Gel Electrophoresis

Biorad Sub-Cell gel electrophoresis systems for separation of nucleic acids, using submerged agarose gels.

  • The large Sub-cell offers numerous gel lengths, comb types and lane configurations: gel sizes of 15×10, 15×15, 15×20 and 15×25 cm. Bromophenol blue dye migration rate of 3 cm/hr at 75V.
  • The Mini Sub-cell GT electrophoresis Systems (Biorad) allows 7×7 or 7×10 cm gels with 8 or 15 sample combs available. Bromophenol blue dye migration rate of 4.5 cm/hr at 75V.

All mini cells accommodate Biorad ReadyAgarose precast gels.

Small Vertical Gel Electrophoresis

The Biorad Mini Protean Tetra Cell runs up to 2 mini protein gels for fast and accurate protein separation. Typical run times: 15-20 min at 300V for Mini-Protean TGX gels and 35-40min at 200V for ReadyGel/handcast gels.

All mini cells accommodate Biorad Precast gels.

Large Vertical Gel Electrophoresis

The Adjustable Slab Gel Systems (C.B.S. Scientific) are designed for separating and characterizing protein and short nucleic acid sequencing runs using acrylamide gels, from 145 mm to 400 mm in length.

Power Supplies

Two types of high voltage power supplies are available:

  • GE 3501 High Voltage (3500 V, 150 mA, 100 W)
  • Biorad PowerPac High Voltage (20–5,000 V, 0.01–500 mA, 1–400 W).

UV Illumination

The Invitrogen Safe Imager 2.0 Blue-Light Transilluminator is designed for quick and safe viewing of stained gels. The LED source passes through a blue filter producing a single-intensity signal at approximately 470 nm. Compatible stains include SYBR Safe DNA gel stain, SYBR Gold, SYBR Green I and II, SYPRO Ruby, SYPRO Orange and Coomassie Fluor Orange.

Hand-held Analytik Jena UV lamps are also available; longwave 365 nm and shortwave 254 nm.

Gel Transfers

The Biorad Trans-Blot Turbo Transfer System is a fast, efficient and reproducible transfer system for transferring proteins from gels to membranes in as little as 3 minutes.

Compatible with Biorad Ready-to-use transfer packs and buffers.

Note: The BI has other equipment supporting gel electrophoresis: a Biorad Chemidoc MP for gel imaging.

Instrument
Uses

  • Separation of nucleic acids, proteins, and other small molecules

Sample
Requirements

  • Suitable samples and non-hazardous methods

System
Requirements

  • Gel and buffer materials, standards, blotting materials