Maxiprep reagents - (Oct/01/2010 )

Someone else in my lab did some maxipreps several years ago, and still has 4-5 columns left over. I would like to use these columns for my own maxipreps but I am dubious that the reagents that came with them are still viable after this time, especially as the bottles containing them appear to have turned yellow... (plus one of them, P1 containing RNAse, that needed to be stored in the fridge, appears to have disappeared altogether).

Does anyone know if it is possible to buy Qiagen reagents separately outside the kits without buying the columns at the same time? since I assume the columns are the expensive part of the kits and it makes sense to use stuff we already have! I have tried searching online and have found details of the composition of the reagents, but not whether I can buy them separately.

The Qiagen Plasmid Purification Handbook is here.

You can prepare your own buffers -- see Apendix B on pages 44-45 -- or you can buy them from Qiagen -- see page 49 in the Ordering Information section.

HomeBrew on Fri Oct 1 11:40:40 2010 said:

Thank you! I thought I downloaded the maxiprep handbook but the one I downloaded is a different file to that one, with only 44 pages, weird! Thanks anyway I hope I can find the correct stuff now

Looking at the products it is cheaper to buy the full buffer kit (£64) than it is to make them seperately, as the RNAse A which I don't have to hand, is only sold in large 2.5ml aliquots, far more than I would need, and costs £172 just by itself!

Also see this openwetware page:
http://openwetware.org/wiki/Qiagen_Buffers

Make your own buffers. Please do not waste your money!
http://www.bioprotocols.info

philman on Fri Oct 1 10:17:43 2010 said:

I'm succesfully using columns from a kit opened in 2005 and they work pretty well (but it is not qiagen)