Module 1, Lab 01 - Phenol-chloroform DNA extraction

Today we had our first lab (what an experience!) in which students started extracting DNA from their own blood. We had the assistance of Dr. Lisa Walden and her students from ONU's Clinical Laboratory Science, who very kindly offered to do the phlebotomies necessary to obtain the samples.

The exercise took longer than expected, so we didn't finish the process, but the samples were frozen after the cell lysis step and will be ready to continue with the addition of phenol-cholorform-isoamyl alcohol (PCI) in the next lab session.

Tomorrow: Restriction Enzyme Analysis (RED) of lambda-DNA.

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Friday, September 10, 2010

Module 1, Lab 02 - Restriction Enzyme Digestion (RED) of Lambda DNA

A micrograph of multiple bacteriopages

Restriction enzymes are one of the most basic and important tools in molecular biology. They evolved in bacteria to attack and cut (cleave) foreign DNA, mostly from bacteriophages (viruses that "eat" bacteria). But hey have been isolated to be used in the lab, and are useful to cut any kind of DNA, not just viral.

Cleaving DNA is the first step in any technique that involves recombinant DNA technology. There are techniques that use special enzymes to paste (ligate) different fragments of DNA. For instance a gene can be ligated into a plasmid that can be inserted into bacteria to make many copies of it via bacterial reproduction (cloning), something we will do in a few weeks.

Today we used lambda DNA (DNA from the common lambda bacteriophage) as the substrate to be cleaved with three different restriction enzymes: EcoRI, HindIII, and PstI.

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Lecture, chapter 3 - DNA, RNA, and proteins

Today we finished chapter 3 on the basic structure and function of DNA, RNA, and proteins.

We talked about characteristics of base pairing in DNA, characteristics and functions of different kinds of RNA, the central dogma of molecular biology, and about the very basic structure of proteins.

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Lecture, chapter 3 - DNA, RNA, and proteins

Today we had our first lecture. We introduced the course and had an overview of the syllabus. Then we had an overview of the "road map" of this course, a series of major topics that are the backbone of what the course is going to be, and how each one of the chapters fit within such plan.

We staring covering chapter 3, on DNA, RNA, and proteins. We talked about the very basics structure of nucleotides and their components, how they are linked, and the rationale behind their nomenclature. We finished the lecture talking about the double helix structure of DNA.

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Welcome to the Introduction to Molecular Biology class, Fall 2010-11

Welcome to the intro Molecular Biology class (Biol 217) of the Fall quarter 2010-11!

In this blog you will find updates of our progress in the class, both in lecture and in the lab. You can use it as a topic guide for studying for exams and make comments when ever you see it fit.

The blog will also be used as a means of posting information relevant for the class, such as external links, occasional changes in scheduling, and general announcements.

If you have any ideas to improve the blog or about information that you would like to see posted, please send me an e-mail. Cheers and good luck this quarter!

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