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Cell Culture Media Supplements |
Improve your cell culture with Gibco media supplements
Media supplements are often a vital component of successful cell culture experiments. There are many advantages of using cell culture supplements including customizing the growth conditions of your cells, improving cell viability and growth, and keeping cells healthier longer.
Gibco cell culture media supplements help ensure the reliability and consistency of your cell culture and research results.
Antibiotics
Proper supplementation of cell culture media with antibiotics can protect your cells from contamination. In addition, certain selection antibiotics are used for stable transfection and the development of cell lines.
L-glutamine & GlutaMAX supplement
L-glutamine is an essential supplement providing energy to rapidly dividing cells. Gibco GlutaMAX offers enhanced stability and supports improved cell health.
Growth factors & cytokines
Growth factors and cytokines are important for the proliferation and development of cells in culture. Gibco PeproTech recombinant growth factors and cytokines offer quality and consistency to support robust cell culture and disease models.
Cell culture buffers
It is important to provide a buffer to cells to protect against changes in pH. This essential buffering is achieved by including HEPES or sodium bicarbonate based buffer in your cell culture media.
Bovine serum albumin (BSA)
BSA provides cells in culture with enhanced nutrition, reducing the need for supplementation with serum. BSA is also useful in other laboratory workflows, including as a blocking reagent for immunoassays.
Other media supplements
We produce an extensive selection of cell culture media supplements to support of the growth and maintenance of your cells. Choose Gibco media supplements to customize your cell culture.
Additional media supplements
Cell culture buffers
Sodium bicarbonate used in cell culture
Sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3) is a common buffer used in cell culture for maintaining the pH of the medium in the presence of 4–10% carbon dioxide. In addition, sodium bicarbonate provides some nutritional benefits and is rarely toxic to cells.
The final concentration of sodium bicarbonate in media depends on both the formulation of the media and carbon dioxide concentration of the incubator. Different CO2 concentrations are recommended depending on the concentration of sodium bicarbonate used. If the media formulation contains:
- NaHCO3 (g/L) <1.5, it needs CO2 at 4%
- NaHCO3 (g/L) 1.5–2.2, it needs CO2 at 5%
- NaHCO3 (g/L) 2.2–3.4, it needs CO2 at 7%
- NaHCO3 (g/L) >3.5, it needs CO2 at 10%
HEPES buffer used in cell culture
Although bicarbonate is the most commonly used cell culture buffer due to its nutritional benefits, the buffering capacity of bicarbonate is reduced at physiological pH compared to HEPES buffer. HEPES has no nutritional benefits to cells but can be added to buffer cell culture media at pH 7.2 through 7.6. Therefore, the addition of HEPES can allow for extra buffering capacity when cell culture requires extended periods of manipulation outside of a CO2 incubator.
Gibco HEPES (4-(2-hydroxyethyl)-1-piperazineethanesulfonic acid) is a zwitterionic organic chemical buffering agent and is categorized as a "Good" buffer which derives from a set of buffers described by Dr. Norman Good and his colleagues in 1966 (Good, et al. Biochemistry 1966).
"Good buffers" such as HEPES are attributed with the following characteristics:
- pKa values between 6.0 and 8.0
- High solubility
- Membrane impermeability
- Limited effect on biochemical reactions
- Very low visible and ultraviolet light absorbance
- Chemically and enzymatically stable
- Easy to prepare
The level of HEPES in cell culture media may vary from 10 mM to 25 mM. In Gibco DMEM, HEPES is present at a concentration of 25 mM. However, in Gibco DMEM/F-12, it is found at a concentration of 15 mM. The most commonly used concentration is 25 mM.
Other cell culture supplements
2-mercaptoethanol
The widely used chemical compound 2-mercaptoethanol has the formula HOCH2CH2SH. It is a hybrid of ethylene glycol and is used to reduce disulfide bonds. By scavenging hydroxyl radicals (amongst others), it can act as a biological antioxidant. The hydroxyl group confers solubility in water and lowers volatility.
Amino acid solutions
To prolong the viability of cells in culture and stimulate growth, supplements of amino acids can be added to media. In addition, adding an amino acid supplement provides nutrients and reduces the biosynthetic burden on cells in vitro. Prepared in distilled water, the non-essential amino acids in this solution are 100X the concentration in a MEM-alpha medium.
HAT supplement
HAT supplement is a liquid mixture of sodium hypoxanthine, aminopterin, and thymidine. After dilution, HAT is suitable for use as a post-fusion selective medium to eliminate unfused or self-fused HGPRT-myeloma cells. Hypoxanthine and thymidine provide preformed purines and pyrimidines for DNA synthesis by hybridomas via the salvage pathway that utilizes HGPRT—contributed by the fused spleen cell. The folic acid antagonist, aminopterin, inhibits the de novo nucleoside biosynthesis pathway.
HT supplement
HT supplement liquid is a mixture of sodium hypoxanthine and thymidine. After dilution, HT supplement is suitable for use as a rescue medium. HT supplement provides preformed purines and pyrimidines to overcome the effects of residual intracellular aminopterin. Following reestablishment of the de novo biosynthesis pathway, HT supplementation can be discontinued.
MEM vitamin solution
Adding MEM vitamin solution to media can enhance cell growth and viability in culture and reduce biosynthetic burden on cells in vitro. Prepared in 0.85% saline, the vitamins in this solution are 100X the concentration in a standard MEM medium.
Sodium pyruvate
Sodium pyruvate is often supplemented into cell culture media as an additional source of carbon. Gibco sodium pyruvate for cell culture is supplied as a 100 mM (100X) solution with a final concentration of 11,004 mg/L.
Phytohemagglutinin
Phytohemagglutinin is a solution produced from a crude extract of the red kidney bean Phaseolus vulgaris. When applied at certain concentrations, this supplement can induce blastogenesis in various mammalian mononuclear cells in vitro.
Try the Gibco MediaSelect Tool
Easily find a media solution suited to your specific application. Use this interactive tool to select classical basal, protein expression, or viral vector media.
Your selections will allow you to choose from a catalog menu of media – or customize your own formulation to fit your experimental setup and budget. Where available, you can compare media formulations side-by-side.
GMP manufacturing
Gibco cell culture products are manufactured in facilities compliant with current good manufacturing practices (GMP) and adhere to a robust quality management system, helping to ensure the consistency, reliability, and high quality you can rely on.
Sustainable solutions
We are committed to delivering products that serve the research needs of our customers, while striving to develop them in a way that minimizes our use of natural resources and our impact on the environment.
Resources
Cell Culture & Transfection Learning Center
Access cell culture and transfection educational resources for better experiment planning and execution.
Gibco Cell Culture Basics
Learn the fundamentals of cell culture for achieving consistent results, including laboratory setup, safety, and aseptic techniques.
Media Formulation Tool
Find the right Gibco media formulation for DMEM, DMEM/F-12, MEM, and RPMI-1640 media.
Related products
Support
Cell Culture & Transfection Support Center
Find technical support recommendations for your cell culture and transfection workflows, including tips for experimental setup and in-depth troubleshooting help.
Need technical support? Contact our expert team for technical and application support of Laboratory Products.
For Research Use Only. Not for use in diagnostic procedures.