Even the cleanest of cell sample preparations will have a degree of cell clumping, which is why all samples must be filtered prior to being run on FlowCore equipment.
Sometimes you will find that your cell sample clumps even after filtering. This is particularly common with adherent cell lines and samples from digested tissue, i.e. where enzymatic and/or mechanical dissociation is necessary. It is important to be as gentle with your cell preparation as possible. Clumping is usually caused by DNA being released into solution; by minimising the amount of mechanical digestion you will reduce cellular rupture due to shearing forces, and thereby reduce the amount of DNA in solution.
Some other tricks you might try:
- adding EDTA to your final suspension
- adding DNAse to your final cell suspension. |
