Consistent tube labeling

Labeling tubes and plates in a consistent manner expedites the experimental process, and decreases the time taken to understand what others have done.

1.5ml microcentrifuge tubes

These 1.5ml microcentrifuge tubes are used to store extracted plasmids, cleaned up PCR or digested products, and frozen liquid culture.

Labeling:

• Black pen = Circular DNA, Blue pen = Linear DNA
• Folding part: Plasmid Backbone ("A" for pSB1A2 or "C" for pSB1C3 or "X" for other)

On top (in this order):

• Item name
• Concentration (in ng/uL written in red)
• "(PCR)" for PCR products; "(XP)","(SP)","(ES)","(EX)" for digestions

On top (in this order):

• Date (YYYY-MM-DD)
• Person who made it
• In red pen: the A260/280 and A260/230 ratios
• For Digestions, write the number of hours (or "overnight") it was digested

200uL microcentrifuge tubes

200uL microcentrifuge tubes (or PCR tubes) are used as temporary storage of various reactions such as digestions, ligations, colony PCR, and temporary liquid cultures.

Labeling:

Folding part: Write the day of the month.

On top: Write something that can identify what it is (at least one english letter).

Additional:

• Colony PCR tubes: Write everything in Black pen.
• Colony PCR LB tubes: Write everything in Blue pen.
• Digestion: Write the cutting site (e.g. SP,XP)
• Ligation: Make sure you put it in those small bags for 4C overnight ligation after 1uL is taken out for transformation

Agar plates

Agar plates are for transformations and obtaining single colonies.

Labeling:

On top (agar side):

• Full item names (not just numbers!), date (YYYY-MM-DD), time of incubation start.
• Additionally for transformation plates: Name of person who did the plating.

On side (still on agar side): type of antibiotic (A/Amp or C/CHL/CM).

On bottom (non-agar side): Don't write anything here.

PCR

For any kind of PCR, make sure to list:

• the things that are PCR'd, and their expected PCR lengths.
• the PCR mix protocol: write the 50uL first, then to multiply to get the new mix total version.
• the PCR time protocol (the 94,[94,55,72]x30-35,72).
• how the gel was loaded. Which wells was loaded with which items.
• Which items were correct and are wrong after the gel run, in as much detail as possible (e.g. was the output the length of a self-ligated vector?)

Two-day efficient cloning cycle

We used an efficient two day cloning cycle split into a "Heavy" day and a "Light" day.

Approximate Light day:

1. 10am (5min): Plate->4oC
2. 10:05am (~1hr): 3-in-1, put liquid and plate in fridge.
3. Lunch
4. After lunch (~1hr): Run Gel
5. 5pm: Incubate

Approximate Heavy day:

1. 10am (2-3hrs): Plasmid extraction & Digestion
2. Lunch (while digesting)
3. After lunch (2-3hrs): Gel Extraction/Purification + Ligation + Transformation
4. 5pm: Incubate plate

Light Day

The light day consists of Colony PCR and liquid culture of colonies transformed from a previous day.

The 3-in-1

The 3-in-1 protocol consists of a combination of three things:

1. Colony PCR
2. Liquid culture
3. 2nd time plate

Time needed: [10min + 1min/colony]

Preparation

1. First, count the number of colonies you want to check.
2. Make the Colony PCR mix (we use Thermo' DreamTaq) with the mix amount slightly modified:

Making Gel for gel electrophoresis

Gel electrophoresis

Liquid culture

Heavy day