To evaluate the performance of the magnetic nanoparticles as gene transfer vector for breeding transgenic animals, we investigated\r\na new approach to deliver green fluorescent protein (GFP) gene to porcine kidney 15 (PK-15) and porcine embryonic\r\nfibroblast (PEF) cells using PEI-modified magnetic nanoparticles as gene vector. The morphology of the nanoparticles and\r\nnanoparticle/DNA complexes was characterized using scanning electron microscopy. It was found that the surface of the particles\r\nbecomes coarse and rough with increased average diameter, which implied the effective conjugating between nanoparticles\r\nwith DNA. The zeta potential of nanoparticle/DNA complexes drops down from +29.4mV to +23.1mV comparing with pure\r\nnanoparticles. Agarose gel electrophoresis experiments show that DNA plasmids can be protected effectively against degradation of\r\nexonuclease and endonuclease. The efficiency of gene delivery was affected by the mass ratio of nanoparticle/DNA and the amount\r\nof nanoparticle/DNA complexes. We confirm that the most optimal mass ratio of nanoparticle/DNA is 1 : 1 by conducting a\r\nseries of experiments. This work provides important experimental basis for the application of the magnetic nanoparticles on gene\r\ndelivery to porcine somatic cells, which is significant for the achieving of breeding new transgenic cloned pigs by using somatic\r\ncell nuclear transfer technique.
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