A simplified method to calculate telomere length from Southern blot images of terminal restriction fragment lengths.

A simplified method to calculate telomere length from Southern blot images of terminal restriction fragment lengths. Biotechniques. 2019 Dec 11;: Authors: Lincz LF, Scorgie FE, Garg MB, Gilbert J, Sakoff JA Abstract Southern blotting of DNA terminal restriction fragment lengths is the gold standard for measuring mean telomere length. Analysis of the final image is a crucial step in this process, however, current techniques are cumbersome and prone to error. Here we present a simple and accurate method for analyzing telomere smears. Basic 2D gel imaging software was used to automatically subtract background, generate standard curves and calculate net intensity and MW at each position (i) along the telomere smear. Our method required no statistical software or major data manipulation and correctly classified >80% of 18 samples as having short, medium or long telomeres compared with 33-72% using other methods. PMID: 31825239 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: BioTechniques - Category: Biotechnology Authors: Tags: Biotechniques Source Type: research