Recent technological advances in the generation of recombinant adenovirus vectors have been applied to a wide range of studies in developmental biology. These vectors have allowed analyses of the regulation of expression and function of specific genes as well as evaluation of patterns of cell migration during development. Recombinant adenovirus-mediated transgene delivery has several advantages over standard transgenic approaches (such as transgenesis achieved through pronuclear injection). Adenoviruses can be used to deliver transgenes to specific tissues (of a variety of different animal species) at specified developmental time points through surgical application. Such methods are likely to be less costly, use fewer animals, and be more time efficient than more traditional transgenic delivery systems.
