BIOL359 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Cell Nucleus, Galactose, Electric Field

• School: University of Waterloo
• Department: Biology
• Course: BIOL359
• Professor: Jonathan Witt

Document Summary

Is technique for separating and analyzing mixtures of charged molecules. (cid:862)to carry with electricity(cid:863) Nucleic acid molecules, both dna and rna are negatively charged due to the phosphate groups in their sugar phosphate backbones. These negatively charged molecules (anions) will migrate toward the positive electrode (anode) Before they can be exposed to the electric field, nucleic acid molecules have to be suspended in a semi- solid matrix, also called a gel. Agarose is a natural polysaccharide of galactose and 3,6-anyhydrogalactose derived from agar, which is obtained from certain marine red algae. Made by dissolving the dry polymer in boiling buffer, pouring the gels into casting trays and allowing them to solidify by cooling at room temperature. Depends on the gel pore size and the size and the conformation (shape) of the nucleic acid molecules: pore size is determined by the concentration of the dissolved agarose. High percentage agarose gels are used for the separation of small dna molecules.