Simple Electroporation of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii Strains With an Intact Cell Wall

Chlamydomonas reinhardtii is a model green alga extensively used to study photosynthesis and cilia using molecular biology and genetics. Electroporation is a very common technique to integrate DNA into the nuclear genome, which is essential to generate mutant collections and express transgenes. Here, we describe a simple, fast, and efficient protocol to transform strains with an intact cell wall. The technique achieves good transformation efficiency without cell wall digestion or the use of commercial kits and is compatible with the widely available Gene Pulser electroporation system. Key features • High transformation efficiency of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii strains with an intact cell wall. • Faster than currently available electroporation protocols.