Week 2 Lab: DNA Gel Art

Lab: DNA Gel Art

Today in lab, we attempted to make DNA Gel Art using restriction enzymes and software (Benchling). In recitation, we were given an example of someone using time-controlled gel work to create an image, so I came up with a plan to use that framework to create an image of Pac-Man.

I used SalI, which cuts only a single 500 bp strand from lambda DNA, for my digest to create my “blocks” that I would effectively “stack” as I pipetted them at interval times on the gel.

I worked with another classmate, Devorah, and together we created our gel with the agar and TAE buffer, and ran our gels at 150+ volts.

Devorah tried to make a dragonfly-looking structure, which required a variety of restriction enzymes. After making our gel, we let our digest reactions incubate for 30 minutes, then created the loading samples and ran the gels. I set serial, 4-minute timers that prompted me to pipette the next “row” to create my pacman image.

After I was finished, my gel took an unfortunate tumble to the ground, and was imaged in pieces.

In the end, it looks like the digestion did not go according to plan, as no DNA appeared to have traveled down the gel, and only the dye created the facade image. However, It is also entirely possible that by serially pipetting into the same wells, a buildup of DNA occurred and the 500bp strands that were supposed to fall into place got stuck (I am less inclined to believe this, though, because I would expect at least 1 500bp band to make it to the bottom, and none were present effectively). Overall, this was a fun project, and I took pleasure in trying to come up with an alternative approach to execute my creative goal, eventhough my results didn’t come out as expected.

Devorah’s design also wasn’t quite what we were expecting, and I think its also related to an improper digestion reaction.

Gemini AI was consulted for formatting