What lysis buffer should I use for my western blot? Well, we have a few questions that we'd like you to answer prior to starting your experiment. For instance, where is my protein of interest? What is my starting material? What is the assay I'm performing?
For generating whole cell lysates, we recommend using Cell Lysis Buffer, RIPA Buffer, or SDS. Cell Lysis Buffer is great because it can be used in a variety of applications and it does not contain harsh detergents that will denature your proteins. RIPA Buffer contains NP40 and sodium deoxycholate. We generally recommend this buffer for tissue extraction because it's a harsher buffer and it can solubilize nuclear membranes. SDS can be used for generating whole cell lysates but can also interfere with protein quantification assays.