We do not put an expiry date on most of our Lympholyte® products as they are stable for years when stored as recommended (i.e. unopened and protected from light). We have performed stability testing on Lympholyte® that is 5 years old, and found it to work very well.

If it has not been opened and has been stored properly (i.e. in the dark) it should work; however, it is best to use a recently produced batch.

Which Lympholyte® you would use will depend on the species from which the lymphocytes are being isolated from, and whether they are being isolated from lymphoid organs or blood. We offer Lympholyte® specific for mouse, rat, rabbit and human lymphocytes (Lympholyte®-M, -R, Rabbit and -H, respectively). If you need to isolate lymphocytes from mammalian blood, we would recommend using Lympholyte®-Mammal or Lympholyte®-H. We also offer Lympholyte®-Poly for the isolation for human polymorphonuclear cells. For the isolation of cells whose density falls outside the range of the premade Lympholyte media, we offer Lympholyte®-1.1, a density gradient medium whose density can be set where needed.

We recommend using Lympholyte®-Mammal with mouse blood, however you can use Lympholyte®-M as well. You will not recover as many cells as you would using Lympholyte®-Mammal, and there will be more RBC contamination in the interface.

Serum may cause the cells the clump together which causes them to pellet, leading to lower lymphocyte recovery.

Lympholyte®-Poly is designed for isolating human granulocytes. Unfortunately, none of the other Lympholyte® products will do this, and the granulocytes end up in the pellet at the bottom of the tube. By using a RBC lysing buffer (i.e. NH4Cl) and some washing steps, you can purify your granulocytes from the pellet. For more information, please contact our technical services department.