Hi, could anyone suggest if cotton or polyester swabs would enable greater recovery of buccal cells and the subsequent higher quantity of DNA isolated?
I think both are fine as far as the swab has been done properly.
I have always used cotton swabs , the quality of gDNA i get is best. And plus cotton swabs wont cost u much
however if u want to avoid the remnants of cotton fibers while extraction which is highly unlikely to effect the DNA extraction , u can go for polyester ones..but of course they will cost u little more.
In my experience, they are the same for DNA. The preferences differ when it comes to recovering pathogens from these swabs.
Personally, I think cotton is better able to grab the cells than polyester, but it hasn't made a difference as far as CT values. I just spend a few extra seconds on collection with polyester.