Using only a Beer Glass and a few other household items and ingredients.
Greg Laden's Blog
Evolution, Life Sciences, Science Education, Human Evolution, and Stuff
Looking for stuff about birds?
Learn more about Charles Darwin and his work.
Lean more about lions
An archaeological expedition to the Congo
The Skeptical Search Engine
The contents of Greg Laden's Blog are copyrighted by Greg Laden.
Recent Comments
- Greg Laden on What is Markdown and why use it?
- No one on New Theory of Dinosaur Extinction
- Satish Goda on Fun with the Linux seq command
- Donald Iljazi on What is Markdown and why use it?
- Greg Laden on The grey squirrel from a birder's point of view
- Charles on The grey squirrel from a birder's point of view
- Greg Laden on The grey squirrel from a birder's point of view
- Greg Laden on Seismic Activity at Yellowstone
- Connie Davis on Who has a higher IQ, cats or dogs?
- lynda on Seismic Activity at Yellowstone
Search
Profile
Click on "About" for the big picture, and "Archives" for the details.
Recent Posts
- Looking for stuff about birds?
- Environmentally Friendly Hard Drive Case
- Charles Darwin February 12, 1809 - April 19, 1882
- Whitney Houston has died
- Lions!
- Changing the rep of Fungi one mushroom-based robot thingie-builder at a time
- More Mississippi Meanderings
- Is climate change a leftist scientific conspiracy to destroy America?
- Oldest Animals Discovered in Namibia
- Wild Mississippi
Blogroll
If you don't see yourself on my blogroll, just drop me a line and let me know. I'll add you.*- 10,000 Birds
- Alpha Meme
- a Nadder!
- Angry by Choice
- Armchair Dissident
- (((Billy))) The Atheist
- blogfish
- blogSci
- Blond Nonbeliever
- Blue Lion Blog
- Bug Girl's Blog
- Camels with Hammers
- Catalogue of Oganisms
- Cassandra's Tears
- Class M Planet
- Cocktail Party Physics
- Counter Minds
- Cranky Linguist, The
- Crowded Head, Cozy Bed
- Dead Racist Society
- Deep Sea News
- Dispersal of Darwin
- Divine Afflatus
- Dread Tomato Addiction
- Evil is Underrated
- Evolved and Rational
- Evolving in Kansas
- Evolving Thoughts
- Fellman Studio Blog
- Flying Trilobite
- Further Thoughts
- Hoxful Monsters
- ICBS Everywhere
- Illusory Tenant
- It's Alive!!
- Jafcisa
- Letters from a Broad
- Life Before Death
- Looking For Detachment
- Matharu's Rants and Raves
- Mors dei
- Natural Reckonings
- Nature Blog Network
- Providentia
- Qeyḥ bāḥrī
- Quiche Moraine
- Religion, Sets, and Politics
- Sandwalk
- Sarah Zielinski
- Science Notes
- The Seething Primate
- Skepchick
- Spanish Inquisitor
- Splendid Elles
- Survival Machine
- Synapostasy
- TalkOrigins
- Tangled Up in Blue Guy
- Tetrapod Zoology
- The Flying Trilobite
- The Inoculated Mind
- The Intersection
- The Loom (new)
- The Scientific Activist
- The Unexamined Life..
- The Zone
- Thinking for Free
- Think Progress
- Three Toed Sloth
- Toomanytribbles
- Traumatized by Truth
- Truth Is a Woman
- udreamofjanie
- Uncommon Liberty
- View from the Pond
- Vickie Henderson Art
- When Pigs Fly Returns
- Writer's Daily Grind
Archives
- February 2012
- January 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- February 2011
- January 2011
- December 2010
- November 2010
- October 2010
- September 2010
- August 2010
- July 2010
- June 2010
- May 2010
- April 2010
- March 2010
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- August 2008
- July 2008
- June 2008
- May 2008
- April 2008
- March 2008
- February 2008
- January 2008
- December 2007
- November 2007
- October 2007
« Cool Google Trick | Main | Rick, Erin, Robert and Skepchick!!!! »
Extract DNA In Your Kitchen
Posted on: January 7, 2009 7:02 PM, by Greg Laden
TrackBacks
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://scienceblogs.com/mt/pings/89449
Comments
Neat! That looks like it would be a pretty easy lab to do.
Posted by: Stacy S. | January 7, 2009 7:19 PM
I gotta run to the drugstore and get some isopropyl alcohol. Otherwise I've got all the other ingredients.
Now I know what the heat is for, to denature the proteins. Ahhhhh. Now once you've got the DNA separated out how do you separate the base pairs?
Posted by: Tony P | January 7, 2009 7:44 PM
Well, Tony, separating the helix can be done with heat as well, which is why he talks about being careful to not get it too hot. If you wanted to amplify this DNA sample you'd be using PCR. That involves heating a sample up, to the point of unzipping the helix, in the presence of a solution containing the 4 base pair elements and a thermally stable enzyme that will zip up the helix. You heat, separating the strands, then cool, allowing the enzyme to zip the free floating bases onto your two strands. Then you heat and cool again to come up with 4 strands. Repeat until you have the concentration you want.
A lot of times you're only interested in a small chunk of the genome, so you use more enzymes to trim a section of the strand out, then work at duplicating that.
So, to do that at home, you'd need to order the appropriate enzyme(s), and a small supply of the 4 bases. I'd be surprised if those weren't readily available. I've seen electrophoresis/PCR kits for kids at Fry's Electronics.
Posted by: Fargo | January 7, 2009 8:07 PM
A friend of mine from YouTube made a similar video a while back. She's also got a bunch of other neat experiments (like how to measure the speed of light with marshmallows in your microwave).
Posted by: The Science Pundit | January 7, 2009 9:17 PM
Hmmm ... Onion-soap DNA milkshake ... [drools]
Posted by: Ricky | January 7, 2009 9:29 PM
thats COOL!!
i wanna do it :)
Posted by: anonymous | April 8, 2009 11:47 PM