What is gel electrophoresis?
What is gel electrophoresis used for?
To separate macromolecules based on their size and charge.
This is what you put in to allow the fragments to move.
The (agarose) gel.
What are the DNA samples also called?
fragments
What is a health risk while performing gel electrophoresis?
Electrocution
poisoning from ingestion
How does fragment size affect the speed that the DNA moves through the gel?
Larger fragments move slower and smaller fragments move faster.
These is for storing the fragments.
Wells
What do you do to run an electrical current through the gel after the cables are connected. (Not a trick question)
Turn on the power source.
What does the electric current do to the samples.
It pulls DNA towards the positively charged side.
How can you tell which is the DNA ladder?
It'll have many bands in a large range
If you remember which well you put it in
Why do the wells need to be placed near the negative charge?
The DNA needs to move towards the positive charge with enough space.
This makes the fragments move.
The electrical current.
You connect these to give the box a charge.
The electrical cables.
Compared to a 5000 bp fragment a 1500 fragment will move _____.
faster
What would happen to the very small fragments if the box was left running for too long.
The smallest fragments would run off the edge.
What does DNA stand for?
Deoxyribonucleic acid.
The fragments move towards this electrical charge.
Positive
The DNA ladder is used for this.
The DNA ladder is used to compare the sample fragments to fragments of known lengths
What does bp stand for?
Base Pairs
What would it mean if no bands were visible after running the gel?
The DNA is spread too thin because the samples have many differently sized fragments.
What is agarose gel made of.
Certain red algaes.
List three macromolecules that could be studied with gel electrophoresis.
DNA fragments, RNA, and Proteins.
How many wells are there and what goes in each.
There are four wells.
One is for the DNA ladder and the other three are for samples.
Why does DNA have a negative charge?
There are phosphate groups inside DNA
These two things are used to make DNA groups visible.
DNA binding dye and UV light.
Why does some DNA group as seen in the results?
Certain size fragments move at the same speed to the same spots.