Agarose, low gelling temperature

Agarose is an algal polysaccharide. Agarose is a thermoreversible, ion-dependent gelling agent. Agarose gel electrophoresis is useful for the clinical routine analyses of proteins in plasma and other body fluids. It is a low gelling temperature derivative with unique gelling properties. Gels forms at <30°C, remelt at temperatures in excess of 60°C. Gels exhibit excellent clarity and are particularly useful for the preparation of media containing heat-labile materials.

Agarose, a low gelling temperature derivative, is the suitable reagent for:

• plant cell culture studies
• insect cell culture studies
• cell culture studies

It may be used for the following studies:

• Recovery of defined RNA and DNA fractions after electrophoretic separation.
• Cytochemical staining procedure to investigate the succinate dehydrogenase (SDH) activity in pre-ovulatory mouse oocytes.
• Purification of RNA in Caenorhabditis elegans by electrophoresis.

The following is a list of properties associated with our agaroses:
Sulfate content - used as an indicator of purity, since sulfate is the major ionic group present.
Gel strength - the force that must be applied to a gel to cause it to fracture.
Gel point - the temperature at which an aqueous agarose solution forms a gel as it cools. Agarose solutions exhibit hysteresis in the liquid-to-gel transition - that is, their gel point is not the same as their melting temperature.
Electroendosmosis (EEO) - a movement of liquid through the gel. Anionic groups in an agarose gel are affixed to the matrix and cannot move, but dissociable counter cations can migrate toward the cathode in the matrix, giving rise to EEO. Since electrophoretic movement of biopolymers is usually toward the anode, EEO can disrupt separations because of internal convection.