Genomic DNA extraction from the medicinal plant Crocus sativus : Optimization of Standard Methods

Abstract

High-quality genomic DNA is essential for genomic and molecular investigations such as next-generation sequencing. However, DNA extraction from medicinal plants like Crocus sativus can be challenging due to their high secondary metabolite content, which can interact with nucleic acids and affect the quality and yield of extraction. This study aimed to optimize the quality and yield of DNA using the cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) extraction method from the leaves, stigma, and saffron corm. This new method is easy to use and can be performed using standard equipment and inexpensive reagents. The modifications made to the CTAB lysis buffer in this study, with the addition of SDS, resulted in a yield of 4233 ng/µl of DNA per sample of saffron corm (100 mg). This protocol is efficient and cost-effective for DNA extraction for studies with large samples and limited resources. This method is expected to be widely used for large-scale plant extraction and has a broad application in PCR-based sequencing studies.