Method for high yield preparation in large and small scale of nucleic acids from mycobacteria

Abstract A simple and very straightforward method for the extraction, in both large scale and micro-scale, of high molecular weight DNA and RNA from mycobacteria is described. The method requires few manipulations, is independent of previous mycobacterial culture conditions and is extremely efficient, yielding nucleic acids of very high quality which allowed the construction of genomic libraries of Mycobacterium leprae, M. tuberculosis and M. bovis BCG. The influence of several variables, such as mechanical treatment and chemicals used is discussed.