Efficient RNA Interference of Primary Leukemic Cells for Loss-of-Function Studies in Xenograft Mouse Models

RNA interference (RNAi) is a powerful tool for efficient and highly specific gene silencing. Transduction with lentiviral vectors provides stable and long-term gene expression in slowly and non-dividing cells. This chapter describes how to couple these two technologies to efficiently silence specific genes in primary acute myeloid leukemia (AML) cells for subsequent xenotransplantation in immunocompromised mice. This approach could be used for loss-of-function studies aimed at identifying oncogenic targets in AML.