Vivid Colors™ pcDNA™6.2/N-YFP-DEST Vector - FAQs

Now that Thermo Fisher Scientific is selling the Vivid Colors Aequorea victoria fluorescent protein vectors and Clontech is not, have there been any changes to the licensing requirements?

Use of our Vivid Colors fluorescent protein vectors is described under the Limited Use Label Licenses accompanying the product. For use in research at academic or government (non-profit) agencies, the purchase of the product (as a catalog item) from Thermo Fisher Scientific is sufficient; no further licenses are required. For use in research at a commercial (for profit) entity, a commercial-use license is necessary for Aequorea victoria derived proteins; this applies to EmGFP, YFP, CFP and BFP. For any questions related to licensing, please send an e-mail to outlicensing@lifetech.com

Can I use E. coli containing an F' plasmid, such as Top 10F', to propagate a vector with the ccdB gene?

While the F' plasmid does contain the ccdA gene that can inhibit or reduce the toxicity of the ccdB gene product, the ccdA expression level is likely to be too low, or inhibition may not be complete, and the bacteria would still be exposed to the ccdB gene product and thus not grow. Therefore, bacterial strains containing the F' plasmid are not recommended as hosts for propagation of ccdB containing vectors.

For propagation of Gateway vectors containing ccdB, we recommend the One Shot ccdB Survival 2 T1R Competent Cells (A10460), which were specifically designed for that purpose. However, please note that these cells are not validated for propagation of other ccdB-containing vectors like the older pZErO plasmids, and in most cases they are not expected to work due to very high levels of ccdB protein expressed in those vectors.