Complementary DNA (cDNA) is synthetic DNA derived from reverse transcription of mRNA by the reverse transcriptase. cDNA clones are very useful genetic tools for a variety of research applications such as gene expression analysis, protein expression, gene cloning, and functional analysis. Introns pose a problem when the eukaryotic gene is expressed in prokaryotes because most prokaryotes do not have any mechanism for the removal of introns. But cDNA can be promptly expressed in prokaryotes such as bacterial cells, because the cDNA lacks introns. cDNA clones can be used to express proteins in a variety of ways to increase protein expression levels, or to produce proteins in the desired form or isoform. cDNA clones are also used as probes in microarray to study gene regulation. In microarray analysis, cDNA clones can be used to simultaneously detect and quantify the expression of thousands of genes to study gene expression patterns in different tissues or during different physiological processes. In addition, cDNA clones can be used as probes for in situ hybridization to study the localization of gene expression in different tissues.
A cDNA library is a collection of host cells bearing cloned cDNA fragments and contains only the actively transcribed genes. cDNA libraries are commonly used to reproduce eukaryotic genomes and express eukaryotic genes in prokaryotes. cDNA is synthesized from fully transcribed and processed mRNA, so cDNA libraries lack information about enhancers, introns, and other regulatory elements. cDNA libraries are useful in reverse genetics where additional genomic information is less useful. In addition, cDNA libraries are often used for functional cloning to identify genes based on the function of encoded proteins.
Amerigo Scientific offers a range of expression-ready and sequence verified cDNA clones to save the time of synthesizing, cloning, and validating cDNA clones from biological materials, which allows the research professional to rapidly advance cloning and genome editing projects.
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