transformante

Transformante is a term used in genetics and biotechnology to refer to an organism, cell, or tissue that has acquired exogenous genetic material through a transformation event. In English, the equivalent word is transformant. The DNA may be carried on a plasmid, be integrated into the chromosome, or exist as episomal DNA, and the resulting transformant may exhibit stable inheritance or transient expression.

Transformation can be natural, as in competent bacterial strains capable of taking up DNA, or artificial, using chemical treatment, electroporation, or other physical methods. In plants, transformation often uses Agrobacterium tumefaciens or particle delivery; in yeast and mammalian cells, standardized protocols exist for DNA uptake. Transformants are typically generated in controlled laboratory settings for research, production, or functional studies.

Transformants are usually identified and isolated through selective markers such as antibiotic resistance or auxotrophic complementation, and screened by reporter genes (for example, GFP) or molecular assays to verify the presence and expression of the introduced DNA. Distinguishing transformants from transgenic organisms can depend on whether the DNA is stably integrated into the genome; transgenic generally implies heritable, genome-wide integration, while transformant may refer to cells or organisms with any form of DNA uptake, including episomal maintenance.

Transformante is widely used in Spanish- and Portuguese-language literature on genetic engineering and microbiology to describe subjects in transformation studies. The term emphasizes the occurrence of the transformation event and the resulting genetic change in the recipient.