- Only cut gels on a clean glass plate (never use overhead projector foils)
- Wear gloves at all times
- Use a new clean scalpel blade for precise cutting
- Clean glass plate and scapel with 70% ethanol and lint-free towels (like from Kimberly-Clark Kimtech Science)
If you are going to cut out the gel bands yourself from a gel, please follow carefully the following instructions:
- Precisely cut out only the band ─ any excess gel will lead to background noise
- Chop the gel band into approx. 1 mm squares
- Please don’t cut them too small, else we might lose them during processing
- Label an Eppendorf tube (0.5 mL) with your initials and a number
- Place the gel cubes in a clean Eppendorf tube (0.5 mL) and add enough water just to cover
- Check the lid is shut before placing in an envelope to send
- You can send them without cool packs and also no dry ice is needed
- Don’t forget to include your service request form in the package and a gel image where you indicated the bands of interest, labeled with the numbers that correspond to the number on the Eppendorf tube