Re: I am extracting DNA from fruits/vegs. How do I weigh the extractions?

Hi! Sounds like you have a fun science fair project! It should be equally easy to extract DNA from banana, onion and tomato, so pick which ever one you like best

Here's an on-line guide to extracting onion DNA:

DNA Extraction from Onion using Murphy's Oil Soap

And here's one to extract tomato DNA:

Scientific Amerian - the amateur scientist, September 1998

How to make a kitchen centrifuge

As for weighing the extractions -- I'm assuming that you mean you'd like to weigh the DNA that you get when you are done. You should probably get a couple of grams worth of DNA so any kind of scientific scale should do the trick -- I'm sure your school's science lab has something suitable.(N.B. there's more than just DNA in the "threads" that you hook out of the final solution, but that's another e-mail)

What are you going to do with the DNA after you extract it? My curiosity is piqued! Please e-mail me! I'm sure I can give you some more details and hints if you'd like them!

Best of luck!

Sincerely

Andreas Matern

Cornell University Dept of Plant Breeding and Biometry

alm13@cornell.edu

http:// www.people.cornell.edu/pages/alm13/