Confusion over terminologies - (Jan/15/2007 )
Hi,
Very recently I started doing transfection and infection. I am really getting confused over the terminologies like is transduction, infection and stable transfection same? Is the names change if you use retro or lentiviral vectors? and over that I do not find much information available on www when compared to other techniques.
what I would say :
transformation of a bacteria (electroporation and chemicals)
transfection of an eucaryote cell (electroporation, nucleofection, lipofectamine, Ca)
infection of an eucaryote cell (via an infectious agent like lentivirus, adenovirus...)
transduction ??
transduction is the process by which a DNA fragment is delivered by bacteriophage.
please, see the wikipedia link on this. 
transformation of a bacteria (electroporation and chemicals)
transfection of an eucaryote cell (electroporation, nucleofection, lipofectamine, Ca)
infection of an eucaryote cell (via an infectious agent like lentivirus, adenovirus...)
transduction ??
So does this mean that the transductions that we do to create new cell lines using viral vectors are infact, called 'infections'?
I also read the link submitted by Fred, but still confused over this - that link says transduction is used for bacteriophage infection to a bacterial cell. So using viral vectors for mammalian cells to create new cell lines is called - infection? Am I right in my understanding?
I was taught that a virus infects a cell, and that the genes themselves are transduced to the cells.