Have you ever paid attention to the commonly used small utensils and centrifuge tubes? Today, EKK disposable medical consumables helped you sort out the classification of different centrifuge tubes, and small centrifuge tubes also have big questions.
The different materials can be divided into plastic and glass. Plastic centrifuge tubes are mostly used and can be divided into PP, PC, PS, etc. According to different needs, manufacturers will choose different plastic materials for production.
Commonly used centrifuge tubes in the laboratory are plastic and glass. Generally, plastic is used more, because glass centrifuge tubes cannot be used in high-speed or ultracentrifuges. Plastic centrifuge tubes are made of PP (polypropylene), PC (polycarbonate), PE (polyethylene), and other materials. PP pipe performance is relatively better. The plastic centrifuge tube is transparent or translucent, and the centrifugation of the sample can be seen intuitively, but it is relatively easy to deform and has poor corrosion resistance to organic solvents, so the service life is short. Therefore, laboratories purchase centrifuge tubes frequently. The following is a brief introduction to each material.
PP (polypropylene): translucent, with good chemical and temperature stability, but it will become brittle at low temperatures, so do not centrifuge below 4°C.
PC (polycarbonate): good transparency, high hardness, can be sterilized at high temperature, but not resistant to strong acid and alkali and some organic solvents such as alcohol. It is mainly used for ultra-high-speed centrifugation above 50,000 rpm.
PE (polyethylene): opaque. It does not react with acetone, acetic acid, hydrochloric acid, etc. It is relatively stable and tends to soften at high temperatures.
PA (polyamide): This material is a polymer made of PP and PE. It is translucent and has very stable chemical properties, but it is not resistant to high temperatures.
PS (polystyrene): transparent, hard, stable to most aqueous solutions, but will be corroded by various organic substances, mostly used for low-speed centrifugation, and generally for one-time use.
PF (polyfluorene): translucent, can be used at low temperatures, if the experimental environment is -100 ℃ -140 ℃, you can use the centrifuge tube made of this material.
CAB (Cellulose Butyl Acetate): transparent, can be used for the gradient determination of dilute acids, alkalis, salts, alcohols, and sucrose.
Classification according to capacity
According to its size, it can be divided into 1.5mL, 2mL, 5mL, 10mL, 15mL, 50mL, etc. Domestic centrifuge tubes generally have these specifications, and the commonly used ones are 10mL and 50mL. If your centrifuge is equipped with 30mL or other specifications of centrifuge tubes, you should consider importing them. In addition, centrifuge tubes are also divided into a round bottom and pointed bottom, as well as screw cap and plug cap. Centrifuge tubes with screw caps have finer scales, and those with plugged caps have only one overall capacity mark.