Manipulation of baculovirus vectors

The development of expression vectors from baculoviruses has provided molecular biologists with one of the most efficient and effective ways of synthesizing foreign gene products in a heterologous system. In contrast to the other recent excellent reviews on the subject (1,2), this contribution aims to explore the various practical aspects of the system, and in consequence, to highlight particular difficulties that may be encountered by workers new to the field. However, before describing the methodology peculiar to baculovirus expression vectors, it is of value to briefly consider the isolation, structure, and replication strategy of this unique group of viruses. Detailed and more comprehensive reviews that describe the biology of baculoviruses are available (3-5).