Name: ______Hour: ______Date:______
Virtual Electrophoresis Lab
Go to
On the left side of the screen, click on “Virtual Labs”. It will open a new window.
Click on “Gel Electrophoresis”.
Do the following as you work through the virtual lab.
On the “Problem” tab:
- What will you be doing in this virtual lab?
On the “Explore” tab:
- What is the micropipette used for?
- Do smaller or larger pieces of DNA travel farther through the agarose gel?
- What does the power supply do?
- Should the same pipette tip be used for more than one sample?
- Why is TBE buffer added to the gel?
- What is in the beaker on the counter?
On the “Procedure” tab:
If a step tells you to use the Lab Notebook, it will not let you continue until you have filled in the Lab Notebook. You will be printing this notebook off at the end to turn in to me. You can close the Lab Notebook after you have typed on one of the pages in it; it will save what you have written in it.
On step 11 of the procedure, you need to record information in the table in the Lab Notebook. The band at the top of the image is “Band 1” for each of the samples (Marker, Victim, Suspect 1, etc.). Lengths are given in the image on the left side of the marker for the blue lines in the marker. For the Marker column in the Lab Notebook you will use Bands 1-6. For the Victim column you will use Bands 1-3. For the Suspect 1 column you will use Bands 1-3. For the Suspect 2 column you will use Bands 1- 4. For the Evidence column you will use Bands 1-4.
After you have answered the questions on the “Analyze and Conclude” section of the Lab Notebook be sure to print it using the “Print” button on the bottom of the Lab Notebook page. This will print your answers to the “Prediction”, “Data” and “Analyze and Conclude” sections of the Lab Notebook. Attach the printed pages to this paper to turn in.