What are your thoughts on trying to rescue contaminated culture. We recently had a mycoplasma contamination and are debating whether to try and rescue it or just starting over.

Answer

This will depend on resources and time. It may be difficult to fully trust the outcome of the experiments after recovery. Also, recovering cells requires time and resources in terms of techniques/media/personnel/equipment to use. At the end of the day the questions are: “Is all the effort worth it? Will I trust the data from this cell culture?”  Starting new may take a week or longer, but you will be fully confident on the results and the data can be used for publication. On the other hand, if you have precious primary cells or other limited samples/reagents, then you will probably want to evaluate rescuing.

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