Recovery of DNA from agarose gels using a modified Elutrap.

We have made a significant improvement in the electroelution device, Elutrap (Schleicher and Schuell) by substituting an agarose gel barrier, which is made from 0.6% agarose (SeaKem GTG; FMC Corporation), into the elution chamber in place of the manufacturer specified BT2 membrane. This modification substantially increases the DNA recovery from agarose gels, even in samples containing less than 1 microgram of DNA, and shortens elution times particularly for large sizes of DNA (greater than 4.4 kbp). Additionally, the gel barrier provides a reproducible quantity and quality of DNA recovery. The high quality of the eluted DNA using the modified Elutrap makes this system suitable for further DNA manipulations.