New DNA separation technique is five times faster

US researchers at the Department of Surgery at Jefferson Medical College and the Kimmel Cancer Center, Jefferson, claim to have developed a technique that makes DNA separation five times faster and less expensive than it is possible now.

Washington, July 19 : US researchers at the Department of Surgery at Jefferson Medical College and the Kimmel Cancer Center, Jefferson, claim to have developed a technique that makes DNA separation five times faster and less expensive than it is possible now.

According to Drs. Jonathan Brody and Scott Kern at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, their electrophoresis process may someday be a ubiquitous tool in DNA analysis and could "save millions of dollars a year, just by speeding up processes".

The discovery could also have a range of applications, from forensics to cloning to bioterrorism, they said.

Most molecular biology-based techniques involve electrophoresis, the main way scientists analyze DNA, but the ingredients involved in the process have remained unchanged for 30 years.

"It turns out that all of the buffers people have been using for 30 years have been the wrong choice, because the standard method is more expensive and takes longer. This solution that we found is literally a better, faster way of doing it," said Dr. Brody.

Dr. Brody said the duo found through trial and error that the compound lithium boric acid in DNA electrophoresis is the optimal solution for this process than the 30-year-old methods currently in vogue.

In electrophoresis, solutions conduct electric current necessary to separate negatively charged DNA molecules. DNA is put through jellylike "gels," and smaller DNA molecules move more quickly than larger ones as the current passes through.

"A process that normally takes around one and a half, two hours to do can be done in 10 minutes - in some instances it can be 10-fold faster. A lot of our science is abstract and incremental. How often do you get a chance to impact nearly every field in science at once?" said Dr. Brody.

Dr. Brody said the finding was "not just a useful discovery for cancer research, but also for the neurosciences, developmental biology - increasingly, many fields involve DNA analysis.

" The process has already been gaining acceptance and use internationally. It's becoming more widespread, but like anything in science, it will take time to become a fixture," he said.

ANI