Reporter gene technology: The future looks bright

Reporter gene technology is widely used to monitor the cellular events asso ciated with signal transduction and gene expression. Based upon the splicin g of transcriptional control elements to a variety of reporter genes (with easily measurable phenotypes), it "reports" the effects of a cascade of sig nalling events on gene expression inside cells. The principal advantage of these assays is their high sensitivity, reliability, convenience, and adapt ability to large-scale measurements. This review summarises the current sta tus of reporter gene technology including its role in monitoring gene trans fer and expression and its development as a biological screen. With the adv ances in this technology and in detection methods, it is likely that lucife rase and green fluorescent protein will become increasingly popular for the non-invasive monitoring of gene expression in living tissues and cells. Su ch techniques will be important in defining the molecular events associated with gene transcription, which has implications for our understanding of t he molecular basis of disease and will influence our approach to gene thera py and drug development. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Inc.