2 ms·

Thank you for the informative comment! Your example of the water bottle is perfect

• vikramkr 7y ago
  Thanks! I was trying to find a universally known example or party trick of something just polymerizing quickly,which I couldn't think of, so went freezing instead (since it looks line if like polymerizing? And I think lots of people have seen those videos showing off that trick). If you want clear, beautiful ice, you've gotta freeze it the right way. But if you want to know if water is cold enough to freeze and don't care about using the ice, bump the supercooled bottle. Trying to convey the differences in constraints between a) detecting dna, where it's a destructive test for all intents and purposes since the end product is just tossed into biohazard - you just wants signal and b) making more usable dna for further research, where you want that end product for further manipulation and so has to high quality, usable dna, not just a polymerized mess. Lots of rapid PCR diagnostics take advantage of this to use gunk-creating rapid tests while scientists working on engineering the same DNA will use temperature cycling processes to clone the DNA and do work on it - each has its use.