Transduction and Transformation

Bacterial transformation is a technique that introduces a foreign plasmid into a bacteria and to use that bacteria to amplify the plasmid in order to make larger quantities of it. This process is based on the main function of a plasmid, which is basically to transfer genetic information that is important to help bacteria survive. Transduction is a process which DNA is transferred from one bacterium to another one with the use of a virus. DNA is introduced into another cell through a viral vector. Transduction does not need cell-to-cell contact. Boyer and Cohen wanted to combine plasmids that were ligated into e.coli by using bacteria and DNA and mix them by fixing the temperature. They wanted the results to be consistent with the bacteria that was being transformed and to have it be recombined. A fair amount of bacteria is also then transformed from the original.