Lysis of fat cells/adipocytes - (Dec/26/2007 )

Greetings people,

I don't have access to a French press nor a sonicator. I wish to break the fat cells from the chicken fat. Can I use methanol to lyse the cell? Whilst eukaryotic cells are different from bacterial ones, I'm not sure if the use of potassium hydroxide maybe able to do the trick. A colleague suggest the use of acid and methanol since he deals with methanolysis of bacteria cells but I want a basic environment throughout. So, I'd appreciate it if you people point me in the right direction.

Thanks in advance

and the contents are??

well, methanol is not going to be very compatible with proteins/nucleic acids. If you want to work with those you need a detergent-based lysis solution to lyse the cell membrane. Since your sample have more fat, you may have to use extra amount of detergent, like Triton-X100.

If you dont want to use any detergent, find a blender and process your sample for several minutes with intervals in between to prevent overheat.

For small molecules, your method should work well, such as for free fatty lipids, triglycerides, but CHCH3/Methanol/sample 2:1:1 may work better.

Vigorous vortexing in a tube with small glass beads is also a method with little chemical bias in what you do next.

Thanks people. Will work on that.