Protocol for the High-quality Plasmid Isolation from Different Recalcitrant Bacterial Species: Agrobacterium spp., Rhizobium sp., and Bacillus thuringiensis

High yield of good quality plasmid DNA from gram -ve bacteria (Agrobacterium tumefaciens, A. rhizogenes, and Rhizobium sp.) and gram +ve bacterium (Bacillus thuringiensis) is difficult. The widely used plasmid extraction kits for Escherichia coli yield a low quantity of poor-quality plasmid DNA from these species. We have optimized an in-house modification of the QIAprep Spin Miniprep kit protocol of Qiagen, consisting of two extraction steps. In the first, the centrifugation after adding neutralization buffer is followed by ethanol (absolute) precipitation of plasmid DNA. In the second extraction step, the precipitated DNA is dissolved in Tris-EDTA (TE) buffer, followed by an addition of 0.5 volumes of 5 M sodium chloride and 0.1 volumes of 20% (w/v) sodium dodecyl sulfate. After incubation at 65 °C for 15 min, the plasmid DNA is extracted with an equal volume of chloroform:isoamyl alcohol (CIA). RNase (20 mg/mL) is added to the upper phase retrieved after centrifugation and is incubated at 37 °C for 15 min. The extraction of the plasmid DNA with an equal volume of CIA is followed by centrifugation and is precipitated from the retrieved upper phase by adding an equal volume of absolute ethanol. The pellet obtained after centrifugation is washed twice with 70% (v/v) ethanol, air dried, dissolved in TE buffer, and quantified. This easy-to-perform protocol is free from phenol extraction, density gradient steps, and DNA binding columns, and yields high-quality plasmid DNA. The protocol opens an easy scale up to yield a large amount of high-quality plasmid DNA, useful for high-throughput downstream applications. Key features The protocol is free from density gradient steps and use of phenol. The protocol is an extension of the QIAprep Spin Miniprep kit (Qiagen) and is applicable for plasmid DNA isolation from difficult-to-extract bacterial species. The protocol facilitates the direct transformation of the ligation product into Agrobacterium by skipping the step of E. coli transformation. The plasmids isolated are of sequencing grade and the method is useful for extracting plasmids for metagenomic studies. Graphical overview [Image: see text] Overview of the plasmid isolation protocol (modified QIAprep Spin Miniprep kit) of the present study