ABSTRACT
Transfection refers to techniques for introducing cloned, double-stranded Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) into cultures of dividing cells in such a way that it can be taken up by the nucleus. Double-stranded DNA is typically mixed with a transfection reagent and added to the culture medium in which the cells are growing. This chapter considers the types of experiments that transfection makes possible, some common transfection methods and strategies and provides some alternatives to transfection. Neuroscientists often use transfection to express proteins so as to study their functional properties. The expression construct is then mixed with a transfection reagent and added to cultures of a cell line that does not normally express the channel/receptor in question. Some cells may be highly resistant to all of the common transfection techniques. A reverse-transcribed copy of the Ribonucleic acid genome of the retrovirus becomes incorporated into the genome of the infected cells permitting stable expression.
