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Overview of chemical transfection methods
Chemical Method
Principle
Advantages
Disadvantages
Examples
Cationic polymerNegatively charged nucleotide backbones form complexes with cationic polymers, which are then taken up by cells via endocytosis
  • Cost-effective
  • No viral vector required
  • Can be applied to a variety of cell types
  • Very low transfection efficiency (< 10%)
  • Highly cytotoxic to some cell types (e.g. sensitive cells and generation of stable cell lines)
  • Can only be used for transient transfection
  • Diethylaminoethyl (DEAE)-dextran
  • polybrene
  • polyethyleneimine (PEI)
  • dendrimers
Calcium phosphate co-precipitateNucleotides, calcium and phosphate buffer are combined to form a precipitate that is taken up by cells via endocytosis.
  • Cost-effective
  • Can be used for transient and stable transfection
  • Neurons tolerate transfection well with little cytotoxicity
  • Low transfection efficiency
  • Transfection strongly dependent upon experimental conditions (e.g., cell constitution, pH, quality and amount of used nucleotides)
  • Cytotoxic to most sensitive primary cell lines
  • Calcium phosphate
Cationic lipidNegatively charged nucleotides form complexes with cationic lipids, which then pass through the cell membrane and release the nucleotides into they cytoplasm via endocytosis
  • Easy-to-use, minimal steps required
  • High transfection efficiency
  • Works with a wide variety of eukaryotic cells
  • Effective on dissociated cells and slices
  • No package size limit
  • Difficult to target specific cells
  • Not applicable to all cell types
  • Low transfection efficiency in most primary cells

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References
This online resource may be cited as follows
MLA
"Quest Database™ Overview of chemical transfection methods." AAT Bioquest, Inc., 4 Apr. 2026, https://www.aatbio.com/data-sets/overview-of-chemical-transfection-methods.
APA
AAT Bioquest, Inc. (2026, April 4). Quest Database™ Overview of chemical transfection methods. AAT Bioquest. https://www.aatbio.com/data-sets/overview-of-chemical-transfection-methods.
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