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Invent Biotechnologies, manufacturers of innovative molecular biology products for life science research, announce the release of their new line of fast, simple protein extraction kits.  The new Minute™ Kits utilize proprietary spin column-based technology in order to reduce the amount of time required to perform protein extractions by about 90% compared to standard methods, such as RIPA buffer extraction, and offer similarly great time savings while being significantly easier to use than competing protein extraction kits. “At Invent Biotechnologies, it is our goal to develop innovative products that make laboratory research faster and easier,” explained Dr. Q. Lee, Chief Technology Officer...

Introduction Proteomic research using adipose tissues are increasingly common. It is relatively easy to extract total proteins from most cell types and tissues however it is much more difficult to extract high quality total proteins from adipose tissues. A common feature shared by adipose tissues is their high lipid and low protein content. In average, the protein content accounts for less than 2% of total cellular mass, making it technically very challenging to isolate high concentration total proteins from adipose tissues [1]. Here we report a high efficiency total protein extraction method from adipose tissues.

Protein Extraction from Adipose Tissues--- A Tough Challenge Adipocytes are the major energy storage sites in the body and they also have critical endocrine functions.  Therefore, understanding the development and function of adipocytes are essential to understanding metabolic homeostasis under physiological and pathological conditions. In recent years, proteomic research using adipose tissues are increasingly common [1]. It is relatively easy to extract total proteins from most cell types and tissues however it is much more difficult to extract high quality total proteins from adipose tissues. As shown below, there are basically three types of adipocytes (Brown, Brite and white). A...

Tips for Detecting Phosphoproteins by Western Blot Protein phosphorylation is very important for protein post-translational modification that controls many cellular processes including metabolism, transcriptional and translation regulation, degradation of proteins, cellular signaling and communication, proliferation, differentiation, and cell survival [1]. Approximately 35% of human proteins are phosphorylated. Phosphoproteins are low in abundance, and, therefore, are, sometimes, challenging to detect and characterize by Western blot and other methods. Western blot is the most common method for detecting and quantifying phosphorylated proteins. Western for phosphoprotein is not really different from a regular Western blot but following factors need pay attention to in...

RIPA Buffer- The Potential TroublesInvent Biotechnologies Inc.Radioimmunoprecipitation assay buffer (RIPA buffer) is the most commonly used buffer for total protein extraction from vertebrate cultured cells and tissues [1] Extracted proteins can be used for a variety of downstream applications such as SDS-PAGE, Western blotting, nucleic acid binding, immunoprecipitation, co-precipitation, ELISA, enzymatic activity assay and affinity-based protein purifications. Due to the large heterogeneity of proteins and interfering contaminants, it is a great challenge to simultaneous release and solubilize all proteins in a given sample. Integration of proteins into membranes and the formation of complexes with other proteins or nucleic acids in...