Exploring Electrophoresis and Forensics Replacement Kit

This product is great for practicing agarose gel-making and loaded. Its nice because they include a blue stain, so theres no need for EtBr. I gave it 4 stars for the price because you can use dyed water and your own gel box (if you have one), if you goal is just to have students practice gel loading. However, it does include a good real life scenario, which is helpful for engaging the students and can help in understanding the big picture.

Our lab does this experiment every semester, but this is the first time our replacement kit came with pre-aliquoted DNA in 20-µL tubes. As the students were performing the experiment, we found that some tubes had as little as 7-8µL of DNA (after being centrifuged), and our TA ended up having to combine some of the tubes to reach the full 20µL. I called Carolina immediately after class to address the issue and was told that this has never been a reported issue in the past. Then I was told that sometimes the liquid evaporates (although we had the kit for only one week prior to its use). They suggested adding water, but unfortunately we had already carried out the experiment. Ideally, we should have received the full amount of DNA for which we paid and that is advertised. However, if evaporation truly can occur, especially in as little as one week, instructions to add water should be documented with the kit so that its users can adjust accordingly. The pre-aliquoted tubes are a great concept, but they ended up being less efficient than if we had aliquoted the DNA ourselves as we have in the past.

The student groups were unable to visualize the DNA. Though they are novices, it is unbelievable that so many of the groups would have no results. They loaded lanes of loading buffer, and those appeared - just no bands of DNA. Though it teaches that science involves a lot of troubleshooting, it is not optimal for a one-shot experiment.