leaving gel in buffer ! - (May/13/2011 )

Hi all,
I wander, is it possible to leave the gel inside buffer after electrophoresis (turn off the electricity) more than 5 hours? or may be the bands diffuse through gel to buffer?
I did it today, but when i came back to check the band in UV-DOC i didn't see any band!! even the DNA ladder

noyara on Fri May 13 15:17:12 2011 said:

Hello Noyara,

it depends how you have store it ...
in emergency cases, as electricity disconnection :
we stored the gel in buffer inside aluminium foil paper in the fridge,
but the bands & the ladder got more faint ...

i remember once i did it overnight, i saw only a very faint ladder ...

u left the gel inside the tank for 5 hours ... right ?
i think the bands will diffuse in this case ...

DNA will definitely diffuse. How fast it diffuses depends on the agarose concentration and size of DNA molecules. I can see bands after keeping overnight in 3.5% agarose.

Thank you nightingale and chromatin..