Spines from a Tusken Raider's Head

This week I worked on extracting DNA from prickly pear spines in hopes of perfecting a protocol in order to see some banding in my gels. I was able to collect only 40 mg of cholla spines, so Josh was able to collect some prickly pear spines for me in his front yard. Below is a picture of how much 40 mg of cholla spines looks like. It is not very much and I need a packed tube of cholla spines to conduct multiple extractions of 150 mg each.

The difference in this protocol I conducted this week was how there was a 3-hour incubation period at seventy degrees Celsius. It seemed as though this worked because the spines looked like they had turned to a pulp and there would be a more likely chance of extracting DNA. I also used small scissors to cut up the pieces and did some grinding. After running the gel though, I did not see any DNA bands. The next suggestion, given to me by Matt, was to grind the spines with a pestle and mortar to create a powdered substance from the spines and use 150 mg of that plant material for my next extraction. I am hoping it will work.