What is carry-over contamination and how can I prevent it?
Carry-over contamination is the most prevalent cause of amplification failures. It is not only the carry-over of previous positive PCRs but also primers or even other previous contaminating templates. This usually leads to false results. Controls are very important in any laboratory procedure. Always include positive AND negative controls along with any PCR you are attempting. A common plasmid can be used as a positive control template together with appropriate MCS flanking primers. Negative controls usually use water as the “template”. Controls determine reagent fidelity.
