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Competent Cells

Cloning Strains

For cloning experiments choose from several high efficiency competent cell strains. These E. coli strains are T1 phage resistant and are endA deficient for high quality plasmid preparations. Additionally, all competent cells from NEB are free of animal products.

Yeast

NEB offers chemically competent Kluyveromyces lactis cells and variants of this strain that have been tailored for specific protein expression needs. These cells are suitable for transformation with any of our linearized pKLAC series expression vectors.

E. coli for Protein Expression

NEB offers several strains with varying levels of expression control, each with T1 phage resistance and extremely high transformation efficiencies.

As Starter kit NEB recommends the Cloning Competent E.coli Sampler. It contains the four cloning strains at a preferential price.

Competent E. coli – Comparison Table

Use this table to select another company’s competent cell product and find out which NEB strain is compatible. Choose either the product name or catalog number from the available selection, and this tool will identify the recommended NEB product and its advantages. A link to the product page where you can also order the product is provided.
Competent Cell Product Comparison Table

Properties Table

Product NEB # Characteristics
Strains for Cloning and Subcloning
NEB® Stable Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C3040H

C3040I
  • High quality plasmid preparations due to endA mutation
  • Rapid growth recA strain
  • T1 phage resistance (fhuA)
  • Value pricing
  • Free of animal products
NEB® Turbo Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C2984H

C2984I
  • Fastest growth – colonies visible after 6.5 hours
  • Plasmid preparation after 4 hours
  • Tight control/expression of toxic genes (F´lacI8)
NEB® 5-alpha Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C2987H

C2987I

C2987P

C2987R

C2987U
  • Versatile cloning strain
  • DH5α™ derivative
NEB® 5-alpha F’ Iq Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C2992H

C2992I
  • Toxic gene cloning
  • F´ strain with extremely high transformation efficiency
NEB® 10-beta Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C3019H

C3019I
  • Large plasmid and BAC cloning
  • DH10B™ derivative
dam–/dcm– Competent E. coli C2925H

C2925I
  • Dam/Dcm methyltransferase free plasmid growth
Strains for Protein Expression
NEB® Express Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C2523H

C2523I
  • Versatile non-T7 expression strain
  • Protease deficient
NEB® Express Iq Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C3037I
  • Control of IPTG induced expression from Plac, Ptac,Ptrc and T5lac
  • Protease deficient
T7 Express Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C2566H

C2566I

 
  • Most popular T7 expression strain
  • Protease deficient
T7 Express lysY Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C3010I

 
  • T7 expression
  • Protease deficient
  • Better reduction of basal expression
T7 Express lysY/Iq Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C3013I
  • T7 expression
  • Protease deficient
  • Highest level of expression control
T7 Express Crystal Competent E. coli (High Efficiency) C3022I
  • T7 expression
  • Protease deficient
  • SeMet labeling for protein crystallography
SHuffle® Express Competent E. coli C3028J
  • Protease deficient/B strain
  • Enhanced capacity to correctly fold proteins with multiple disulfide bonds in the cytoplasm
SHuffle® T7 Express Competent E. coli C3029J
  • T7 expression
  • Protease deficient/B strain
  • Enhanced capacity to correctly fold proteins with multiple disulfide bonds in the cytoplasm
SHuffle® T7 Express lysY Competent E. coli C3030J
  • T7 expression
  • Protease deficient/B strain
  • Tightly controlled expression of toxic proteins
  • Enhanced capacity to correctly fold proteins with multiple disulfide bonds in the cytoplasm
SHuffle® T7 Competent E. coli C3026J
  • T7 expression/K12 strain
  • Enhanced capacity to correctly fold proteins with multiple disulfide bonds in the cytoplasm
BL21 Competent E. coli C2530H
  • Routine non-T7 expression
BL21(DE3) Competent E. coli C2527H

C2527I
  • Routine T7 expression
Lemo21(DE3) Competent E. coli C2528J
  • Tunable T7 expression for difficult targets
NiCo21(DE3) Competent E. coli C2529H
  • Improved purity of target proteins isolated by IMAC

Further information can be found in our Technical Resources section or at neb.com. Information on trademarks can be found here.