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The BLUEstain™ Protein ladder is a three-color protein standard with 12 prestained proteins covering a wide range molecular weights from ~11 to 245 kDa. Proteins are covalently coupled with a bluechromophore except for two reference bands (one green and one red band at 25 kDa and 75 kDa respectively) when separated on SDS-PAGE (Tris-glycine buffer). The BLUEstain™ Protein ladder, is designed for monitoring protein separation during SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, verification of Western transfer efficiency on membranes (PVDF, nylon, or nitrocellulose) and for approximating the size of proteins. The ladder is supplied in gel loading buffer and is ready to use.

A unique combination of a number of proprietary plasmids digested with appropriate restriction enzymes and PCR products to yield 13 fragments, suitable for use as molecular weight standards for agarose gel electrophoresis. The DNA includes fragments ranging from 250-10,000 base pairs. The 1K and 3K bands have increased intensity to serve as reference points. The approximate mass of DNA in each band is provided (0.5 μg a load) for approximating the mass of DNA in comparably intense samples. The ladder is ready-to-use, and is premixed with loading buffer dye for direct loading on gel.

Dithiothreitol (DTT) is the common name of the more popular of the two Cleland’s Reagents (the other being Dithioerythritol or DTE). DTT is a powerful reducing agent that forms a stable six-membered ring with an internal disulfide bond which is resistant to oxidation. DTT is often used for the following: reducing the disulfide bridge of the cross-linker N,N′-bis(acryloyl) cystamine to break apart the matrix of a polyacrylamide gel, the reduction of disulfide bonds in proteins, the prevention of those bonds from forming between cysteine residues and lastly, DTT is often used to reduce thiolated DNA in order to minimize dimerization.

DTT is a nearly 7-fold stronger reduction agent than βME (β-mercaptoethanol) and has a less offensive odor and is less toxic.

IPTG is an analog of galactose that is non-metabolizable and inactivates the lac repressor to induce synthesis of β-galactosidase in E. coli. The expression of cloned genes under the control of the lac operon is induced by IPTG. It is also a substrate for thigalactoside transacetylase and has been reported to induce penicillinase in bacteria.

Luciferin is a common bioluminescent reporter used for in vivo imaging of the expression of luciferase. This water soluble substrate for the firefly luciferase enzyme utilizes ATP and Mg2+ as cofactors to emit a characteristic yellow-green emission in the presence of oxygen, which shifts to red light in vivo at 37°C. Through the utilization of ATP, the reaction can be further used to indicate the presence of energy or life in order to function as a life-death stain.

Luciferin is a common reagent used throughout the biotechnology field and specifically for in vivo imaging. Luciferase labeled tumor cells, stem cells or infectious diseases are often inoculated into research animals such as rats or mice for investigation. The injection of luciferin allows for the real-time, noninvasive monitoring of disease progression and/or drug efficacy in these model systems through Bioluminescence Imaging (BLI).

Luciferin is also commonly used for in vitro research, including luciferase and ATP assays, gene reporter assays, high throughput sequencing and various contamination assays. ^®

TCEP-HCl is an odorless reducing agent suitable for protein applications and in the preparation for electrophoresis. TCEP is water soluble, is stable in a variety of solutions and is particularly useful in the labeling of cysteine residues with maleimides, preventing the cysteines from forming disulfide bonds. As a reducing agent, TCEP has many other desirable features.