number of copies after pcr? - (Feb/13/2011 )

is there a forumla, where if you know the copy# or amount of dna that you add to your pcr reaction, it will calculate how many copies of the dna you will get after pcr?

claritylight on Sun Feb 13 13:35:38 2011 said:

You know what happens during a PCR? I suppose you do..
If you know this, you could calculate it yourself.

Take for example you start with 2 templates (1 piece of dsDNA). How many pieced do you have after 1 cycle? (4).
And after a second cycle ? (8) and a third? (16) ... you a pattern here?

Try to see if you can get to this: N_n=N₀X.2ⁿ with N₀is your start template (how many pieced you have for the primers to attach to), N_nis the number copies of DNA you have, with small n the #of cycles


(sometimes they use this formula: 2ⁿ with n =# cycles.... but do you think you can use this all the time?)


and keep in mind: this is in theory...