Electroporation of Transgenic DNAs in the Sea Squirt Ciona

INTRODUCTION

The electroporation method described here is probably the mainstay of sea squirt (Ciona) research, because the utility of transgene expression in staged embryo populations enables a wide array of biological questions to be addressed. It allows rapid identification and characterization of cis-regulatory DNA, such as tissue-specific enhancers. Electroporation of plasmids expressing fluorescent reporter genes permits live imaging and lineage tracing. Finally, structure-function relationships can be examined by expressing dominant-negative or constitutively active forms of specific proteins using appropriate cell-specific enhancers.