Alas, poor "magic"! I knew thee well.

[neale at mbcf.stjude.org]

I have followed with some amusement the cries of molecular biologists who are
"lost" without their "magic" plasmid preps. Several authors have quickly
followed with their home-made versions of the "magic" preps to remedy this
intolerable situation. 

Bravo!              

However, we use a very simple boiling method that processes minipreps in bulk
using a microcentrifuge. These minipreps are crude but work well for sequencing
or restriction analysis, and best of all, require no phenol or other "magic"
reagents. The combination of plasmid and host cell that we use is pBluescript,
and DH5 alpha or DH10B cells, respectively.

Just a thought to ease the minds of those that might not be able to make their
own "magic" in the lab.

;-)

Geoff Neale

Dept. of Virology and Molecular Biology          Internet: neale at mbcf.stj.org
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital               Phone: (901) 522-0400
Memphis, TN                                           Fax: (901) 523-2622