title: Liver sinusoidal endothelial cells as possible vehicles for gene therapy: a comparison between plasmid-based and lentiviral gene transfer techniques.
abstract: Liver sinusoidal endothelial cells (LSECs) constitute an attractive target for gene therapy of several liver and systemic diseases. However, there are few reports showing an efficient plasmid-based or viral methodology to deliver recombinant genes into these cells. In the present study, the authors evaluated in vitro gene transfer efficiency of standard plasmid-based techniques (i.e., electroporation, lipofection, and calcium phosphate) and lentiviral-mediated gene transduction into primary murine LSECs, using reporter genes. The results show that electroporation is the most effective in vitro plasmid-gene transfer method to deliver GFP into LSECs (31%), as compared with lipofection and calcium phosphate transfection (6% and 4%, respectively). However, lentiviral transduction resulted in higher, efficient, and stable gene transfer (70%) as compared with plasmid-based techniques.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The highly efficient gene expression obtained by lentiviral transduction and electroporation shows that these methodologies are highly reliable systems for gene transfer into LSECs.
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio de Patología Celular y Molecular, Centro de Medicina Experimental, Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Científicas (IVIC), Caracas, Venezuela.
authors.forename: Jesus
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Paez-Cortez
authors.forename: Ramon
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Montano
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Iacomini
authors.forename: Jose
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Cardier
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000911:Antibodies, Monoclonal / Q000235:genetics; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D018274:Electroporation / Q000379:methods; D042783:Endothelial Cells / Q000502:physiology*; D018014:Gene Transfer Techniques; D017930:Genes, Reporter; D015316:Genetic Therapy / Q000379:methods*; D018799:Intercellular Adhesion Molecule-1 / Q000235:genetics; D016086:Lentivirus / Q000235:genetics*; D008081:Liposomes; D008099:Liver / Q000502:physiology*; D051379:Mice; D010957:Plasmids; D051381:Rats; D014162:Transfection / Q000379:methods; D014409:Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha / Q000494:pharmacology; D019010:Vascular Cell Adhesion Molecule-1 / Q000235:genetics
chemical_list: D000911:Antibodies, Monoclonal; D008081:Liposomes; D014409:Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha; D019010:Vascular Cell Adhesion Molecule-1; D018799:Intercellular Adhesion Molecule-1