What is the difference between freeze-drying and lyophilization?

Freeze drying, also known as lyophilisation or cryodesiccation, is a low temperature dehydration process that involves freezing the product, lowering pressure, then removing the ice by sublimation. This is in contrast to dehydration by most conventional methods that evaporate water using heat.

How do freeze dryers work?

Freeze dryers work by freezing the material, then reducing the pressure and adding heat to allow the frozen water in the material to change directly to a vapor (sublimate).

What is the difference between Lyoprotectant and Cryoprotectant?

Note that lyoprotectants protect during the drying stages whereas cryoprotectants protect during the freezing stages.

What does freeze-drying do to bacteria?

For a detailed protocol on freeze drying bacteria, visit the page Bacteria Freeze Drying Protocol. Preserving bacteria by lyophilization requires that the bacteria are suspended in a medium that helps to maintain their viability through freezing, water removal, and subsequent storage.

Why is freeze drying expensive?

However, most of the currently available freeze dryers require longer drying time, which leads to high energy consumption and high capital cost. This is partly due to the poor heat transfer rate as the sublimation front moves from the exterior to the interior of the frozen material being dried.

Can you freeze dry food in a pharmaceutical freeze dryer?

Harvest Right’s Pharmaceutical Freeze Dryer is ideal for freeze drying herbs, oils, concentrates, rosin, extracts, medicines, remedies, dairy starter cultures, flowers, taxidermy, and other organics.

Is cryoprotectant toxic?

High levels of penetrating cryoprotectants (CPAs) can eliminate ice formation during cryopreservation of cells, tissues, and organs to cryogenic temperatures. But CPAs become increasingly toxic as concentration increases.

What makes a good cryoprotectant?

The dilute solution of diethyl glycol is a good cryoprotectant. A dilute solution of diethylene glycol can also be used as a cryoprotectant; however, ethylene glycol is much more commonly used.

Can bacteria survive freeze-drying?

Bacterial strains were freeze-dried, sealed in ampoules under a vacuum (<1 Pa), and stored in the dark at 5 degrees C. Nonmotile genera showed relatively high survival after freeze-drying. Motile genera with peritrichous flagella showed low survival rates after freeze-drying.

What is lyophilized powder?

Lyophilized powder is a freeze-dried powder. This is a peptide in the form of lyophilized powder, i.e. one that has been freeze-dried. A lyophilized powder is a powder made by freeze-drying.

What happens to my plasmid when I freeze it?

If your plasmid will undergo numerous freeze-thaw cycles, it will degrade faster. Using a salt-stabilized buffer instead of water will help prevent DNA degradation.

What is the best way to store plasmids for long time?

Thanks Michael Agaphonov Amila Zuko Scott Nguyen ! Plasmids can be stored at -20°C for longer than a year as DNA is quite stable. If your plasmid will undergo numerous freeze-thaw cycles, it will degrade faster. Using a salt-stabilized buffer instead of water will help prevent DNA degradation.

Does freeze drying preserve biological activity of non-viral gene delivery systems?

It was shown that a freeze drying process with increased cooling rate can improve preservation of biological activity of non-viral gene delivery systems [8], despite the fact that rapid freezing of naked DNA can extensively damage its structure [23,24].

How do you prevent DNA degradation in plasmids?

If your plasmid will undergo numerous freeze-thaw cycles, it will degrade faster. Using a salt-stabilized buffer instead of water will help prevent DNA degradation. It is best to prepare enough plasmid DNA needed for all related experiments at once and keep multiple aliquots.