High-efficiency transfection of biological cells using sonoporation

An acoustic method for transfecting an exogenous material into cells, the method comprising:

• (a) providing a system that comprises (i) a reservoir containing host cells, gas-filled cationic microbubbles, and the exogenous material to be introduced into the host cells, the host cells and the exogenous material contained within a fluid medium, and (ii) an acoustic radiation generator to generate and direct acoustic radiation;
• (b) acoustically coupling the acoustic radiation generator to the reservoir;
• (c) activating the acoustic radiation generator to generate and direct acoustic radiation into the reservoir in a manner that acoustically activates the microbubbles, wherein acoustic radiation is transferred from the microbubbles to the host cells to provide sonoporated host cells, thereby facilitating introduction of the exogenous material into the sonoporated host cells;
• and
• (d) acoustically decoupling the acoustic radiation generator from the reservoir.