Hi! I am going to be growing up some 15N/13C labelled protein for an
NMR analysis. I'm going to grow the bugs in M9 media supplemented with
labelled NH4Cl and a labelled carbon source. From what I've read,
labelled glucose is used, but it is very expensive.
I was thinking of trying labelled acetate instead (I assume that it's
much cheaper than glucose). I talked about this with one of my
colleagues, and he said that there might be a problem with most of the
label ending up in carbon dioxide. I was wondering if anybody has any
thoughts on whether this would work; if I lose a lot of label as CO2,
is that offset by the (presumed) savings in cost?
By the way, I'm using E. coli strain BL21(DE3). Any tips on growing
conditions, etc. would be welcome.
Thanks!
Matthew Parker
