Hello everybody!

I have to answer a really easy question, but I just cannot find the information anywhere!

What does the "H" in buffer H (a buffer for restriction enzymes) stands for?

 

Could you please help me out? or tell me where I could find the information?

Buffer H is just Tris-HCl, MgCl2 buffer with sodium chloride. Many commonly used DNA enzymes use buffer H as their optimal buffer.

 

It is MOST likely that the letter H was simply the next letter available when they were assigning a name, eg, I am familiar with buffers A, B, C, D, E, H, L, M.....

 

Another, less likely, possibility is that it could have something to do with, for example, the enz Bam H1..... perhaps it was a good buffer for this enz.... But I think that the most likely possability is that it was just a letter to be used at the time.

AFAIK it is just a name. However different companies sell different buffer H with slightly different concentrations of the salts, so it is not an universal name.

One hast to check each supplier for details.