Intracellular internalization mechanism of protein transfection reagents.

A protein transfection reagent is a powerful tool for elucidating a protein function in a cell, and plays an important role in the fields of cell biology and drug discovery. Many researchers have developed protein delivery systems and several systems are commercially available. In this study, we focus on the biological functions of three commercially available protein transfection reagents, Pro-DeliverIN, Xfect, and TurboFect, especially in their internalization routes by HeLa cells. A cellular uptake study using specific endocytosis inhibitors and confocal laser scanning microscope observation revealed that each reagent was internalized into HeLa cells by different mechanism. It is our hope that the results presented here will help in the choice and use of protein transfection reagents for experiments.