Triparental mating

Triparental mating is used for the introduction of plasmids into plant-pathogenic bacteria for transformation.

It requires three bacterial strains:

• a helper strain, carrying the genes that code for conjugation and DNA transfer,
• a donor strain, carrying the plasmid and
• a new bacterial strain to introduce the new gene into

Five to seven days are required to determine if the plasmid was successfully introduced into the new bacterial strain and confirm that there is no carryover of the helper or donor strain.

In contrast, Electroporation does not require a helper or donor strain. This helps avoid possible contamination with other strains. The introduction of the plasmid can be verified in the recipient strain in two days, making electroporation a faster and more efficient method of transformation.