One of the powerful tools to study gene regulation and protein function is transfection. Transfection is a process of introducing nucleic acids like DNA, RNA, siRNA, and oligonucleotides into cells without the use of viral infection. Transfection contributes to the development and advancement of cellular research and drug discovery. The two significant purposes of transfection are - a) to enhance gene expression, b) to produce recombinant proteins.
Transfection is cost-effective and produces recombinant human therapeutic proteins in ample amount, which used to be one of the obstacles in biopharmaceutical industries. Transient cell transfection pulled off these results by avoiding a lengthy and expensive procedure of developing stable transfectants. Transfection has also been used to producer-proteins, viral vectors for therapeutic and gene therapy.