FAQs

All cultures are the same price, except for cultures ordered through Algae Express. All US academic and US government users are charged US $60 per tube and all other users are charged US $120 per tube. Algae Express cultures cost $180 per tube.

Academic and Government Institutions within the United States should enter one of the following discount codes at the checkout screen. You must include the name of the institute you are affiliated with under the 'Company' field in order to qualify. 

• US Academic: us/acad
• US Government: us/gov

Regular Orders (non-Algae Express)
Orders are shipped on a weekly basis. Regular (non-Algae Express) orders placed by Wednesday, 5 pm CST, are shipped the following Monday. If there is a U.S. national holiday that falls on a Monday, orders will be shipped the next business day.

Algae Express Orders
Algae Express orders are only available to ship within the continental United States via UPS Next Day Air. Ordering deadlines for this service are Monday-Thursday (excluding U.S. Holidays) between 8:00 AM - 12:00 PM (Noon) CST. Orders placed on Fridays will not ship out until the next available business day. Algae Express is currently not available for international orders and U.S. customers outside of the contiguous United States. UTEX continues to look into expanding the availability of this service to our customers outside of the continental United States.

We are not currently studying this topic. You should check publications for information: Algal Oil Yields.

We do not aim for optimum growth here at UTEX. Investigators are urged to consult the available literature for alternative media, shaking, or CO₂ infusion if optimum growth is an important consideration in their research.

Cultures should last for a few weeks, maybe months, depending on the strain as long as the culture has proper care.

The screw-cap should be loosened, not removed to allow for gas exchange and if this practice is not customary in your laboratory a note next to the culture may be a good idea. Place the culture tube in an appropriately lighted room or incubator and provide a photoperiod of 16 hours light: 8 hours dark. The culture should be kept at room temperature or 20 °C unless noted in the culture notes.

Those who receive cultures are encouraged to duplicate within reason the conditions used in the Collection, when handling newly acquired cultures, to reduce the chance of losing the culture. After a stock culture is established, subcultures may be used for testing other conditions. Visit the UTEX Culture Maintenance page for additional information and specifications utilized at UTEX.

Search for desired characteristics in the Search box.

UTEX algal cultures are living organisms whose availability can change from week to week. Cultures are removed from the online catalog if they are not considered healthy or if they are being cleaned of contamination. Recovering a culture, or bringing a culture back to health again, is labor intensive. It can take anywhere from 4 weeks to a few months before an organism is successfully recovered.

You can request to be placed on a notification list for any particular UTEX strain that is not currently available for ordering. When the strain is recovered, UTEX will send an email notifying you of the update.