What is the role of acrylamide in SDS PAGE?
Also question is, why acrylamide is used in SDS PAGE?
Acrylamide is soluble in water and upon addition of water it polymerizes resulting in formation of polyacrylamide. It is useful to make polyacrylamide gel via acrylmide hydration because pore size can be regulated. Increased concentrations of acrylamide result in decreased pore size after polymerization.
Thereof, what does the acrylamide do in the experiment?
Hard gels (12-20% acrylamide) retard the migration of large molecules more than they do small ones. In certain cases, high concentration acrylamide gels are so tight that they exclude large molecules from entering the gel but allow the migration and resolution of low molecular weight components of a complex mixture.
For proteins, Sodium Dodecyl Sulfate (SDS) is used to linearize proteins and to negatively charge the proteins. The binding of SDS to the polypeptide chain imparts an even distribution of charge per unit mass.