Microbiological Gelling Agent
Gellan gum, also branded by few suppliers as Grovgel, AppliedGel, Phytagel or Gelrite, is used primarily as a gelling agent, alternative to agar, in microbiological culture. It is able to withstand 120 °C heat, making it especially useful in culturing thermophilic organisms. One needs only approximately half the amount of gellan gum as agar to reach an equivalent gel strength, though the exact texture and quality depends on the concentration of divalent cations present. Gellan gum is used as gelling agent in plant cell culture on Petri dishes, as it provides a very clear gel, facilitating light microscopical analyses of the cells and tissues. Although advertised as being inert, experiments with the moss Physcomitrella patens have shown that choice of the gelling agent - agar or Gelrite - does influence phytohormone sensitivity of the plant cell culture.
Read more about this topic: Gellan Gum
Famous quotes containing the word agent:
“The most durable thing in writing is style, and style is the most valuable investment a writer can make with his time. It pays off slowly, your agent will sneer at it, your publisher will misunderstand it, and it will take people you have never heard of to convince them by slow degrees that the writer who puts his individual mark on the way he writes will always pay off.”
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959)