In vivo electroporation using an exponentially enhanced pulse: a new waveform.

In vivo electroporation is currently accomplished by one of two types of common waveforms: exponential decay or square-wave pulses. The purpose of this report is to present a new electroporation waveform, the exponentially enhanced pulse (EEP). Pulsing protocols including the EEP resulted in high levels of luciferase expression in muscle and skin, equal to or greater than expression resulting from low-voltage, millisecond square-wave pulses. This high level of expression requires fewer pulses when using an EEP protocol. Therefore, similar or greater plasmid DNA expression levels are obtained using fewer pulses with the EEP protocol than with current protocols. This is the first report of this new waveform and shows the success of using protocols employing the EEP to deliver plasmid DNA to various tissue types.