The Scattered Twelve Tribes of HEK293

Abstract

Their ease of growth and transfection makes HEK293 cells a common cell culture in academic research. In addition, high transfection efficiency of HEK293 cells enable production of exogenous proteins or viruses for pharmaceutical and biomedical research purposes. Recently, HEK293 cells has gained attention due to it is versatility for transfection experiments, particularly the propagation of adenoviral-based and retroviral-based vectors during CART-T bioprocess. Since traceability is critical to pharmaceutical manufacturing process, we provide a mini review to clarify the historical development and intent use of different variants of HEK293 cells. This review should provide a key reference for the HEK293 variants’ historical and developmental background.