Aequorin as a reporter gene.

Reporter proteins allow one to monitor cellular parameters that are involved in signal transduction, development, metabolic processes, and transport. There are targeting strategies available to direct the indicator protein exactly to the locale inside the organism from which information is desired. This circumvents experimental reductionism and allows experimentation with whole intact and undisturbed organisms. The outstanding advantages of self-reporting organisms make it worth to shoulder cost- and time-consuming molecular work. Here, the luminescent Ca2+ indicator aequorin is introduced and a rough guideline is given from early planning the molecular work and assembling an experimental setup to experimentation with luminescent Arabidopsis, data processing, and control experiments.