[Histonet] herring sperm dna

[Emily Sours]

Hello all!

Roche has decided to stop manufacturing herring sperm DNA.  I thought this
would be an easy product to replace but apparently there's roughly ten
bjillion versions of herring sperm DNA.  I have no idea whether ours was
sheared, sonicated, molecular biology grade, etc.  It just said herring
sperm DNA on the label.  Any suggestions on a replacement? We are using
this, btw, in hybridization buffer for RNA in situ  on chick embyro sections
on slides.
I called Roche and asked tech services what their replacement would be, but
they just said, here's another DNA product which uses the term hybridization
in its protocol, COT Human DNA, read the tech sheet to see if that's a good
replacement.  Of course, the tech sheet says nothing about whether it would
be good in in situ hybridization buffer, just that it's good for suppressing
cross hybridization in DNA microarrays.  The really frustrating thing is
their DIG in situ hybridization protocol calls for herring sperm DNA.

Emily

Shall we always be content with the ancient tinned salad of the subsidized
novel? Or the tired ice-cream of poems which cry themselves to sleep in the
refrigerators of the mind?
-Lawrence Durrell, Clea