Materials and Reagents

1. 50 ml screwcap polypropylene (PP) tubes, sterile, pyrogen-free (SARSTEDT, catalog number: 62.547.254 )
   
2. 15 ml screwcap PP tubes, sterile (SARSTEDT, catalog number: 62.554.502 )
   
3. Escherichia coli, strain depending on the plasmids used (see Notes)
   
4. Methanol HPLC grade (EMD Millipore, catalog number: 106018 )
   
5. Acetone p.a. grade or higher (EMD Millipore, catalog number: 100014 )
   
6. Dichloromethane p.a. grade or higher (Fisher Scientific, catalog number: 10626642 )
   
7. ddH₂O
   
8. Ammonium acetate p.a. grade (EMD Millipore, catalog number: 101116 )
   
9. Acetonitrile HPLC grade (EMD Millipore, catalog number: 113358 )
   
10. Ethyl acetate HPLC grade (Merck Millipore, catalog number: 113353 )
    
11. Lysogeny broth medium (Carl Roth, catalog number: X968.3 )
    
12. Eluents (see Recipes)
1. Eluent A
   
2. Eluent B
   
3. Eluent C

Equipment

1. For pigment extraction:
1. Photometer (Eppendorf, model: Bio Photometer 6131 )
   
2. Vortexer (Scientific Industries, model: G-560E )
   
3. Ultrasonic bath (Elma Schmidbauer, model: Transsonic T 460 , or BANDELIN electronic, model: Sonorex TK52 ) (see Notes)
   
4. Centrifuge (Beckman Coulter, model: Avanti J-25 )
   
5. Centrifuge rotor for 50 ml tubes (Beckman Coulter, model: JA25.50 ) with round bottom adapters for 15 ml tubes (Corning, model: 8441 )
   
2. For HPLC analysis:
   
1. HPLC system with quaternary pump, in-line degasser, thermostatted autosampler, column heater and photodiode-array (PDA) detector (Waters, models: 2795 Separation Module and 2996 photodiode-array detector )
   
2. C30-Column 250 x 4.6 mm (5.0 µm, 250 x 4.6 mm) (Bischoff, model: ProntoSIL 200-5-C30 , catalog number: 2546H300PS050)
   
3. Guard column 20 x 4.0 mm (5.0 µm, 20 x 4.0 mm) (Bischoff, model: ProntoSIL 200-5-C30 , catalog number: 6302H300PS050) connected to column by guard cartridge holder (Bischoff, catalog number: 1502 0508 )

Software

1. HPLC-Software (Waters: Empower Pro)

Procedure