The use of UV transilluminators for the detection of DNA or RNA in agarose gels, is still very common, although we know quite well that the shorter the wavelenght is, the more the DNA will be damaged quickly, which is dangerous especially if the separated DNA should be used in downstream experiments like cloning or sequencing. Just seconds of UV light are enough to reduce the cloning efficiency significantly.
In contrast to UV instruments, the new innovative LED technology is using a much higher wavelenght, means energy less light. This will lead to the fact that the nucleic acids are not damaged but sometimes sensitivity is lower as compared to UV light. Furthermore regular BLUE LED technology is working well with green dyes but couldn't be recommended with red dyes like Ethidium Bromide, because the longer wavelenght is favorable for green dyes but not for red components.
To solve these problems, Nippon Genetics developed a brand new LED technology which is unique in the world so far. We have developed a so called BLUE/GREEN LED technology and we found out that this technology shows superior sensitivity with green and red dyes.
The Image shows the results obtained with the FastGene Blue/Green Transilluminator. for a complete comparison with UV light click comparison of DNA dyes
The FastGene® Blue/Green LED Transilluminator-XL comes with an attached amber filter shield, which filters the blue/green backlight efficiently. If you want to use gel documentation system you should check if your filters is working properly.
