Transformation of Bacteria by Electroporation

The use of an electrical field to permeabilize cells reversibly (electroporation) has become a valuable technique for transference of DNA into both eukaryotic and prokaryotic cells. Many species of bacteria have been successfully electroporated (1 ) and many strains of E. coli are routinely electrotransformed to efficiencies of 10⁹ and 10¹⁰ transformants/�g DNA. Frequencies of transformation can be as high as 80% of the surviving cells and DNA capacities of nearly 10 �g of transforming DNA/mL are possible (2 ).