How much agar in a plate

Use an open flame e. If there are any bubbles in the plates, briefly pass the flame over to pop them. Just leave them alone and maybe admire your perfect agar plates while you wait! Drying the plate is very important for storing the plates and growing colonies on them. At worst the moisture can affect the plating of your cells. You can use Parafilm, or stack them and store upside down in the plastic bag or plastic sleeve that the plates came in for easy storage.

Guidelines suggest using agar plates within approximately 2 to 4 weeks. A quick way to label your plates is to have a color code for each antibiotic and medium type you tend to use e. Stack the plates and use the appropriately colored lab marker to draw a line down the whole stack. Make sure you keep the color code to hand though.

Now you should have no issues making agar plates that are perfect every time. Originally published July 5, Reviewed and updated February Has this helped you?

Then please share with your network. Hi pouring in plates should be under laminar hood? Then grasp the next unfilled plate lid in the stack and fill it up. Try and only add enough to barely fill in the bottom. This will make sure you have more plates! Let cool and solidify for a few hours or overnight on a table or counter if possible. This lets some of the condensation escape back out before you store them at 4C in your Refrigerator. Remember never to freeze plates they will become cracked and distorted.

Plates can be used immediately after they solidify! Plates should last months depending on how much condensation accumulates in the bag and how sterile you were during the preparation. Cart Search Top. Please wait Call us on Sign in or Create an account. But there are many different recipes to prepare growth media for bacteria, as some bacterial species require different combinations of nutrients.

Follow the specific package instructions regarding the amounts of powder and water to use for the growth media you are making. The recipe to make 1-liter LB agar is 9. If an antibiotic additive is needed in the medium recipe, that is added after the sterilized agar has cooled to 60oC to avoid denaturation.

An autoclave is a high-pressure apparatus that is used by laboratories, dentists, and hospitals to sterilize equipment, instruments, glassware, growth media, liquids and biohazardous waste. The autoclave applies high pressure 15 psi and saturated steam at oC oF for minutes to kill microbes and spores. After the media has gone through this cycle, it is sterile. Cool to oC before adding any antibiotics and pouring into sterile Petri dishes. Introduction Microbes are all around us.

Figure 1. Digital Balances and Weigh Boats Materials disinfectant spray paper towels petri dishes gloves LB agar powder Weigh boat Stir bar mL autoclavable bottle Autoclave tape Sharpie marker colored Deionized or distilled water Electronic balance Autoclave or pressure cooker Metal tray Ampicillin or arabinose Figure 2. Some supplies for preparing plates with media. Procedure Preparing the media Label a clean glass autoclavable mL autoclavable bottle with media name, date, and initial.

Note: only fill bottle halfway, to avoid overflow during the heating process in the autoclave. For a mL bottle, calculate the needed weight of powdered media to make mL. Subtract that from to determine the volume of water to add. Stir or shake until fully mixed and check that there are no lumps.

Add a piece of autoclave tape to the cap or bottle and loosen the cap a half-turn. If using a container with no cap, then cover loosely with aluminum foil. Setting up the autoclave Place the prepared media bottles into a metal tray. Add distilled water until it covers the bottom of the tray; about cm deep. Place into the autoclave. Autoclave at o C for 15 minutes at 15 psi. Once the cycle is complete, wear heat-resistant gloves to remove the tray and bottles from the machine.

Allow bottles to cool to approximately 60 o C. Prepping the workspace: To keep as sterile of an environment as possible to avoid contaminating the media and plates, don a lab coat and gloves, and use a disinfecting agent or wipes to wipe down all surfaces.

This includes tabletops and edges, gloves, scissors, permanent markers, etc.