Bio-Rad Ready Gels® are cast in the 8.6 x 6.8 cm format and designed for use in the Bio-Rad Mini-PROTEAN® 3 cell. The Ready Gel® range consists of Tris-HCl gels for SDS-PAGE and native PAGE applications, Tris-HCl gels with gelatine or casein for zymography, Tris-Trycine gels for the analysis of small proteins and polypeptides and TBE/TBE-urea gels for DNA and RNA analysis.
My experience with the Bio-Rad Ready Gels® has been largely with the Tris-HCl and zymography gels for running bacterial culture supernatants for SDS-PAGE and Western blotting. The Tris-HCl gels are cast without SDS making them suitable for both native and SDS-PAGE applications. They are available as both single percentage gels ranging from 5% to 18% or as linear gradients of 4-15%, 4-20%, 8-16% or 10-20%. The Tris-HCl zymography gels are available with gelatine (10%) or casein (12%) but are, unfortunately, not available as gradients. Ready Gels® are available as both 10 and 15 well gels. The gels are reliable and the resolution provided is excellent. The inclusion of linear gradient Tris-HCl gels to the Ready Gel® range provides a means of effectively analyzing samples containing proteins with a broad range of molecular weights. While I have found this product to be both reliable and effective, the biggest strength of this product is the convenience of being able to go to the fridge, get a gel out and run your sample on it.
While convenient, I would not recommend this product for use in laboratories which use large numbers of gels. Using precast gels is significantly more expensive than casting gels in-house. This product is more suited to laboratories which would only occasionally need to use gels or for applications which require the use of linear gradient gels. Another possible issue with using precast gels which should be noted is that on a couple of occasions, I have had refrigeration problems which have resulted in the gels freezing. This resulted in the loss a box of gels. In addition to the monetary costs, it took a couple of weeks for new gels to arrive. While this is not a criticism of the gels themselves, it is a draw back to purchasing precast gels as opposed to casting them in house.
In conclusion, I have used precast gels from a number of manufacturers for both SDS-PAGE and zymography and have found the Bio-Rad Ready Gel® range to be amongst the best precast gels available. Ready Gels® are a convenient and reliable product. The Ready Gel® range is large and the gels provide excellent resolution and are available in linear gradients. Due to the cost, however, I would not recommend Ready Gels® for laboratories which use polyacrylamide gels on a daily basis as a casting system would be more economical.