Site pages
Current course
Participants
General
Topic 1
Topic 2
Topic 3
Topic 4
Topic 5
Topic 6
Topic 7
Topic 8
Topic 9
Topic 10
Topic 11
Topic 12
Topic 13
Topic 14
Topic 15
Topic 16
Topic 17
Topic 18
Topic 19
Topic 20
Topic 21
Topic 22
Topic 23
Topic 24
Topic 25
Topic 26
Topic 27
3.3.4.2 Agarose
Agar is a heterogeneous mixture of two classes of polysaccharide: agaropectin and agarose. Although both polysaccharide classes share the same galactose-based backbone, agaropectin is heavily modified with acidic side-groups, such as sulfate and pyruvate. The neutral charge and lower degree of chemical complexity of agarose make it less likely to interact with biomolecules, such as proteins. Uses: Gels made from purified agarose have a relatively large pore size, making them useful for size-separation of large molecules, such as proteins or protein complexes >200 kilo Daltons, or DNA fragments >100 base pairs. Agarose can be used for electrophorotic separation in agarose gelelectrophoresis or for column-based gel filtration. |