Difference between revisions of "Resources/Troubleshooting"

Revision as of 20:06, 13 January 2016

This page is under active development and is in draft form. Nothing posted here is finalized.

Learn about cloning troubleshooting here!

Read about General Tips and Tricks with a focus on:

Still have a cloning problem? Contact Traci and ask a question (see right box for contact info)!
Make sure that you also ask your instructors and more experienced students around you!

Welcome!

My name is Traci, and I'm here to help you with your cloning problems.

You can contact me:

by email at traci AT igem DOT org
on Reddit Traci_at_iGEM
on Twitter @Traci_H_Angelli

Introduction

Cloning is difficult. No one who has ever picked up a pipette in the lab would debate this fact. However, cloning shouldn't be impossible! This page exists to help students and teams who are struggling with cloning and other molecular techniques. Treat this page as another resource in your troubleshooting endeavors rather than the be-all, end-all resource for iGEM cloning problems. I hope this will be a helpful resource for every iGEM team!

My background is primarily in bacterial cloning with a focus on working in E. coli. I completed my doctorate in cell and molecular biology from the University of Rhode Island in 2011 and was a postdoctoral researcher in synthetic biology with Dr. Douglas Densmore at Boston University from 2011-2013. From there, I continued to work in the lab as the Executive Director of the Boston University Center of Synthetic Biology and I joined the iGEM Headquarters team in April 2015. In summary, I have over 14 years of experience with molecular techniques and cloning in E. coli, and over 4 years of experience with synthetic biology in particular.

General Tips and Tricks

This section is meant to provide some general advice for cloning problems. I recommend you read through this material if you're having problems while you're waiting for a response to your specific question. Each link below is geared towards a specific area where cloning problems occur.

Transformation Problems

For many teams, cloning problems center around transformation issues. Here I describe some general tips that can be applied to any type of assembly method when using E. coli cells as the transformation host.

Restriction Digest and Ligation Problems

Since we provide teams with nearly 2,000 BioBricks parts, I will discuss common problems students can experience when using restriction enzymes and DNA ligation assemblies, which includes BioBricks Assembly.

PCR Problems

text under development

iGEM Protocols

Below are the links to the various protocols that iGEM Headquarters has provided over the years. These protocols can also be found through the Parts Registry page under the "Help" and "Protocols" links in the black toolbar at the top of the page.

These are another useful resource that teams should read through when they're experiencing cloning problems.

BioBrick Cloning Protocols

Cloning protocols that can be applied to BioBricks and non-BioBricks assemblies

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