RNA samples should best be shipped on dry ice. Please only ship with courier services (FedEx, UPS, DHL).
For longer transports (e.g. from South America) we also had very good success with RNA samples shipped dry at room temperature (after LiCL/ethanol precipitation and ethanol washes; see protocol below).
Please mark the position of the pellet on the tubes in this case!
The protocol below is modified from here: http://www.paralog.com/wiki/?EthanolPrecipitation
- Add 1/10th volume of 8M LiCl to your RNA sample and mix.
- Add 3 volumes of room temperature 100% ethanol (based on the aqueous volume before the addition of LiCl) and mix thoroughly.
- Incubate at -20C for 20 minutes or ON.
- Vortex quickly. Mark the side of the tube that will be positioned towards the outside of the centrifuge rotor (the side the pellet will be located).
- Centrifuge at a minimum of 12000g for 15 minutes in a cooled centrifuge (4C).
- Decant the supernatant.
- Add 500 μl room temperature 75% ethanol and rinse the tube by gentle inversion.
- Respin at 12000g for 2 minutes.
- Decant the 75% ethanol.
- Spin down briefly and pipette aspirate the remaining 75% ethanol.
- Repeat the 75% ethanol wash (the previous five steps)
- Allow the pellet to air dry. The sample is now ready for shipping at room temperature.
The samples can then be resuspended in an appropriate volume of molecular biology grade water (best for short term storage and library preps), EB buffer, or TE buffer (only long term storage). Please let us know how much RNA sample to expect per tube.
Please see this FAQ for RNA isolation tips: http://dnatech.genomecenter.ucdavis.edu/faqs/which-protocols-or-kits-do-you-recommend-for-rna-isolations-from-human-and-animal-samples/
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