The isolation of nuclei from animal cells in culture

Abstract

The following method permits the isolation of nuclei from HeLa cells. Virtually all the nuclei in a population of cells can be recovered and the isolated nuclei are free from adherent cyto­plasm. Examination of nuclei isolated from cells which had been incubated in media containing [ 14 C]thymidine and [ 14 C]adenine indicated that not more than a few per cent of the DNA or of the labelled nuclear RNA were lost during the isolation procedure.