MCAT Mnemonics: Blots

Ken Tao is the MedSchoolCoach expert on MCAT, and helps you remember Southern blot, Northern blot, and Western blot with the acronym: Snow Drop.

Full Transcription

Hey everyone. Welcome back to another MCAT Mnemonic Monday. My name is Ken and I’m an MCAT expert with MedSchoolCoach. Today we have an MCAT biology mnemonic for you, and it’s for molecular biology techniques. The Mnemonic is snow drop.

SNOW DROP is for helping you to memorize the different types of blotting techniques on the MCAT. So you have Southern blot for DNA. Northern blot for RNA. And Western blot for proteins.

So you can see the Snow… Drop for memorizing these molecular biology techniques.

Now real quick southern blot is used to separate DNA. This is often used for genotyping different organisms. Northern blot is for separating RNA molecules. This is often used to quantify gene expression. Western blot is for separating proteins and this can also be used to quantify gene expression.