Bioanalyzer

The Bioanalyzer is a chip-based capillary electrophoresis machine to analyse RNA, DNA, and protein. It is produced by Agilent and widely used, among other things, in RNA quality control measurements before downstream experiments like microarrays.

Protocol for Bioanalyzer RNA nano chip

preparation of material

• 12 samples per chip
• quantitative range 25–500 ng/μl
• quantitation accuracy 20%CV (for ladder as sample)

cleaning, gel preparation (start 40min before experiement)

• take out filtered gel aliquot and fluorescent dye from fridge next door 30min ahead of time (1 gel aliquot tube enough for 2 chips)
• take out ladder from fridge upstairs
• mix one tube gel aliquot with 1µl of dye
• centrifuge 1500g +-20% for 10min
• wash electrodes 1min RNase ZAP, 3min water (pipette into 1 well, will spread)

prepare chip for measurement

• take out new RNA chip (pico or nano) from drawer below microarray machine and put into station
• fill 9µl gel into dark circle G well (gel reservoir)
• press down plunger and wait 30sec (gel moves through channels)
• after 30sec release silver trigger (should jump up well above 0.3, meaning seal was tight)
• wait 5sec, pull plunger up all the way
• open priming station, add 9µl gel to light circle G wells
• 5µl of marker into all sample wells and ladder well, bottom right (contains small marker to align plots)
• 1µl of sample per well, add 1µl of water or replicates into free wells (6µl required per well for machine to run properly)
• 1µl of ladder into ladder well
• vortex in holder for 1min and put into machine

start the run, save data, wash

• choose programme for kit: DNA/RNA pico/RNA nano and material: total RNA/mRNA, prokaryotic/eukaryotic
• start run
• print to export data; with PDF checked will save file, with PDF unchecked will print on paper
• remove chip, rinse electrodes in water for 3min