COLD SPRING HARBOR, N.Y. – Combining the specificity of small interfering RNA (siRNA) silencing with the versatility of lentiviral vectors gives researchers a powerful tool for the investigation of gene function both in vivo and in vitro. This month's issue of Cold Spring Harbor Protocols (www.cshprotocols.org/TOCs/toc8_08.dtl) features a pair of protocols from Inder Verma (http://www.salk.edu/faculty/faculty_details.php?id=54) and colleagues at the Salk Institute describing this method for achieving long-term down-regulation of specific target genes in a wide range of cell types. "Design and Cloning of an shRNA into a Lentiviral Vector" is freely accessible on the website for Cold Spring Harbor Protocols (http://www.cshprotocols.org/cgi/content/full/2008/9/pdb.prot5009)
The second featured protocol for August, "In Vitro Assays for the Extracellular Matrix Protein-Regulated Extravasation Process," provides a method for studying the ways that cancerous cells pass through blood vessel walls, a critical step in metastasis. Written by Xiao-Fan Wang (http://pharmacology.mc.duke.edu/faculty/wang.htm) and colleagues from Duke University, this protocol includes two methods for assaying the role of extracellular matrix proteins in cancer cell extravasation. This article is freely accessible on the website for Cold Spring Harbor Protocols (http://www.cshprotocols.org/cgi/content/full/2008/9/pdb.prot5034).
Source: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory