Cell biology of lipid mediated transfection

Abstract

Gene delivery is a process by which an exogenous copy of the gene or DNA is newlineintroduced into the cell. Gene delivery has tremendous medical implications in newlinetreating several genetic disorders, which are refractory to the conventional newlinemedicines. Several strategies have been developed to introduce the foreign DNA newlineinto the cells. Among the most efficient ones are viruses, which due to their newlinenatural ability to carry the genetic material into the cells have attracted scientists newlineto use them to carry DNA fragment of our interest into the cells. However, due to newlinetheir harmful potential as well as safety concerns, other alternative non-viral newlinemethods have been developed and tested in the recent years to deliver DNA newlinemuch more safely. One promising vehicle among such non-viral categories is newlinecationic liposomes. Cationic lipids have gained popularity because of the several newlineadvantages that they have shown over viral based methods.