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Luciferase Plasmid Collection


Luciferase is the enzyme responsible for the bioluminescence found in a diverse number of organisms, ranging from bacteria to aquatic animals to insects. Luciferase catalyzes the oxidation of a substrate, leading to the emission of photons. The robust signal, sensitivity, wide dynamic range, and resistance to photobleaching has made luciferase a popular tool for scientists investigating the effect of regulatory elements. Elements such as promoters, enhancers and untranslated regions, or RNAi or CRISPR target sites can be inserted into a luciferase-containing plasmid and the effects on gene expression can be measured by the luminescence output.

The most popular types of luciferase found in Addgene’s collection include:

The mammalian codon-optimized version of Firefly luciferase is often referred to as Luc2. Other luciferases in our collection include the red and green Click-beetle luciferases (CBRluc and CBGluc, respectively), Cypridina luciferase, and Luciola luciferase.

Each type of luciferase has advantages and disadvantages for different applications. Firefly luciferase is considerably brighter than Renilla luciferase, but is more susceptible to enzyme inhibition. Both firefly and Renilla luciferase have short protein half-lives, making them useful as transcriptional reporters. However, they are not secreted, so cells must be lysed or the substrate must be delivered intracellularly in order to measure luminescence. Gaussia luciferase is secreted and more stable, making time course experiments possible, but its short luminescence half-life makes it too dim for many experimental systems. Firefly and Renilla luciferase are less-than-ideal protein tags due to their large size. NanoLuc® Luciferase is small, bright, and a secreted version of the protein is available, attributes that have made it popular with scientists since its release.

Note that different luciferase variants require different substrates and detection wavelengths. To learn more about the advantages and uses of different luciferases, check the original publication or read our Luciferase blog post.

Highlighted Luciferase Tools

Modified/Novel Luciferases

  • AkaLuc: A modified firefly luciferase engineered to use the red-shifted substrate Akalumine with significantly brighter signal and emission in the near-infrared range, enabling enhanced bioluminescence imaging in vivo.
  • teLuc: Red-shifted bioluminescence when paired with diphenylterazine (DTZ).
  • LumiLuc and LumiScarlet: LumiLuc and LumiScarlet are ATP-independent luciferases derived from teLuc that emit yellow/green light and red light, respectively, for increased usefulness in in vivo applications.
  • LuxSit-i and neoLux1.2: Artificial luciferases desined de novo using deep-learning approaches.

Split Luciferase

  • NanoBit (Link opens in a new window): The NanoLuc® enzyme is split into Large (LgBiT; 18 kDa) and Small (SmBiT; 11 amino acids) fragments for protein-protein interaction assays. Each protein of interest is fused to either LgBiT or SmBiT. If the two proteins interact, the NanoBiT subunits come together to form an active enzyme and generate luminescence. Find plasmids containing LgBit and SmBit.
  • Cluc-FKBP and FRB-Nluc: Split firefly luciferase reporter of rapamycin-inducible interaction.
  • nLuc and cLuc: Constructs for split firefly luciferase complementation assays in plants.

Bioluminescence Resonance Energy Transfer (BRET)

  • Nano-lanterns, Enhanced Nano-lanterns, and Antares: Fluorescent proteins are fused to Renilla luciferase (Nano-lanterns) or NanoLuc® (Antares and Enhanced Nano-lanterns) to allow for BRET-based in vivo imaging of multiple cellular processes.
  • NanoBRET: Constructs using NanoLuc® as a BRET energy donor and HaloTag protein labeled with a fluorophore as the acceptor.
  • Luciferases with tunable wavelengths: NanoLuc® with either SNAP‐tag or HaloTag in which labeling of the self‐labeling tag with a fluorophore shifts the emission to that of the fluorophore.

RNA Biology

Other Sensors and Tools

  • Optimized STARR-seq (Self-Transcribing Active Regulatory Region) plasmids: Genome-wide screening of enhancer activity using a firefly luciferase reporter. These plasmids improve on the original STARR-seq by using the bacterial ORI as the core promoter, which was a source of false positives with the original.
  • Structurally destabilized firefly luciferases: A set of three increasingly destabilized mutants which serve as sensors of proteome stress.
  • pHLuc: An extracellular pH sensor consisting of a pH-sensitive GFP (superecliptic pHluorin), a pH-stable OFP (Antares), and Nanoluc®.
  • CalFlux VNT: An intracellular calcium sensor created by fusing NanoLuc® and Venus fluorophore to Troponin C Ca2+ binding domain.
  • Luminopsins: Luciferase-opsin fusion proteins for bioluminescent chemo-optogenetics.

Find more plasmids including NanoLuc® fusions, constructs for NanoBRET and NanoBiT assays, and more in the Promega Plasmid Collection.

Empty Backbones

Browse or search for popular empty backbone plasmids into which you can clone your regulatory element or gene of interest into to create a luciferase reporter. Unless otherwise noted, these plasmids are meant for expression in mammalian systems.

ID Plasmid Luciferase Type(s) Description PI
16539 pBV-Luc Firefly Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions Bert Vogelstein
12178 pIS0 Firefly Insertion of target sequence in the 3' UTR David Bartel
12179 pIS1 Renilla Insertion of target sequence in the 3' UTR David Bartel
12177 pIS2 Renilla Insertion of target sequence in the 3' UTR David Bartel
101139 pCMV-IRES-Renilla Luciferase-IRES-Gateway-Firefly Luciferase (pIRIGF) Firefly/Renilla Creating ORF-Firefly luciferase gene fusions. Renilla luciferase under the control of a CMV promoter is present for normalization William Kaelin
71248 pXPG Firefly Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions. Mutations within the luciferase gene allow for increased copy number in E. coli and expression of luciferase in the cytoplasm of mammalian cells Peter Cockerill
64784 pGL3-Basic-IRES Firefly Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions Joshua Mendell
212936 pGL3 Basic Vector Firefly Vector for investigating regions controlling transcription Debrya Groskreutz
18760 MSCV IRES Luciferase Firefly Retroviral expression of firefly luciferase and gene of interest Scott Lowe
21375 pHIV-Luciferase Firefly Lentiviral vector for insertion of your gene of interest upstream of IRES-firefly luciferase. Bryan Welm
60323 pGL4.23-GW Firefly Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions using Gateway cloning. Jorge Ferrer
87067 pcDNA3.1-ccdB-Nanoluc NanoLuc® Creation of N-terminal Nanoluc fusions using Gateway cloning Mikko Taipale
87075 pLenti6.2-ccdB-Nanoluc NanoLuc® Creation of C-terminal Nanoluc fusions using Gateway cloning. Lentival. Mikko Taipale
87078 pLenti6.2-Nanoluc-ccdB NanoLuc® Creation of N-terminal Nanoluc fusions using Gateway cloning. Lentiviral. Mikko Taipale
12563 PCD FL0X Firefly Insertion of imperfect miRNA sequence in the 3' UTR Carl Novina
33154 pAC-Luc Firefly Creation of N-terminal Firefly fusions in Drosopholia Michael Rosbash
128046 pGL3basic luciferase and renilla_polyA Firefly/Renilla Dual reporter vector. Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions upstream of Firefly luciferase. Renilla luciferase is co-expressed. Oskar Laur
87070 pcDNA3.1-Nanoluc-ccdB NanoLuc® Creation of N-terminal Nanoluc fusions using Gateway cloning Mikko Taipale
106253 pLS-mP-Luc Firefly Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions. Lentiviral Nadav Ahituv
106292 pLS-SV40-mP-Rluc Renilla Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions. Lentiviral Nadav Ahituv
108228 pGreen2x35SLUC Firefly/Renilla Creating ORF-Firefly luciferase gene fusions in plants. Renilla luciferase under the control of a CMV promoter is present for normalization. Alejandro Ferrando
114670 pGL3-TK-5UTR-BsmBI-Luciferase Firefly Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions. Blue/white screening can be used for screening of transformants in cloning process. Lynne Postovit
64034 pGL4Luc-RLuc Firefly/Renilla Dual reporter reporter vector allowing the study of biscistronic promoters. Daniel Christophe
119760 pSGDlucV3.0 Firefly/Renilla Dual reporter vector. Insertion of 5' promoter/enhancer regions upstream of Firefly luciferase. Renilla luciferase is expressed from a T7 promoter for normalization. John Atkins
174050 pGWB-nLUC Firefly Creation of N-terminal Firefly luciferase fragment for split-luciferase complementation assay in plants using Gateway cloning. Use with 174051 Alberto Macho
174051 pGWB-cLUC Firefly Creation of C-terminal Fifrefly luciferase fragment for split-luciferase complementation assay in plants using Gateway cloning. Use with 174050 Alberto Macho
136010 psi-CHECK3 Firefly/Renilla Insertion of 3' UTR sequences downstream of Renilla luciferase. Firefly luciferase expression under the control of a HSV TK promoter for normalization. Modified from psi-CHECK2 so both Renilla and Firefly luciferase contain introns Anthony Leung
212935 pGL4.84(hRlucCP/Puro) RapidResponse™ Renilla Vector for investigating regions controlling transcription Pete Stecha
212933 pGL4.82(hRluc/Puro) Renilla Vector for investigating regions controlling transcription Pete Stecha

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Expression Constructs

Luciferase driven by a strong constitutive promoter can be used to monitor transfection or viral infection efficiency, to study changes in cell physiology, or as a reference level of expression. Browse or search for popular plasmids expressing luciferase. We also offer ready-to-use AAV preparations of select luciferase expression plasmids.

ID Plasmid Luciferase Type Promoter Description PI
60226 AAV:ITR-U6-sgRNA(backbone)-pEFS-Rluc-2A-Cre-WPRE-hGHpA-ITR Renilla EF1α AAV-CRISPR knockout plasmid. Renilla luciferase is used to monitor viral transfection Feng Zhang
21471 pLenti PGK V5-LUC Neo (w623-2) Firefly PGK Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase Eric Campeau
21474 pLenti CMV V5-LUC Blast (w567-1) Firefly CMV Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase Eric Campeau
18964 Luciferase-pcDNA3 Firefly CMV Mammalian expression of firefly luciferase William Kaelin
18782 MSCV Luciferase PGK-hygro Firefly SV40 Retroviral expression of firefly luciferase Scott Lowe
105621 Lenti-luciferase-P2A-Neo Firefly EF1α Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase Christopher Vakoc
33307 Ubc.Luc.IRES.Puro Firefly Ubc Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase Linzhao Cheng
74444 pLenti.PGK.blast-Renilla_Luciferase Renilla PGK Lentiviral expression of Renilla luciferase Reuben Shaw
48688 pUltra-Chili-Luc Firefly Ubc Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase and dTomato. A gene of interest can also be inserted into the plasmid. Malcolm Moore
51819 Syn-ATP Firefly (modified) CMV Optical reporter of presynaptic ATP Timothy Ryan
24348 pAC-hRluc Renilla Actin5C Insect expression of Renilla luciferase Liqun Luo
51970 Nano-lantern/pcDNA3 Nano-lantern CMV Mammalian expression of Nano-lantern Takeharu Nagai
87121 pcDNA-RLuc8 Renilla CMV Mammalian expression Renilla luciferase mutant Rluc8, which has increased stability and light output Sanjiv Sam Gambhir
104587 pHIV-iRFP720-E2A-Luc Firefly EF1α Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase and iRFP720 from a bicistronic promoter Antonius Plagge
118017 pLX313-Firefly luciferase Firefly EF1α Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase William Hahn, David Root
118016 pLX313-Renilla luciferase Renilla EF1α Lentiviral expression of Renilla luciferase William Hahn, David Root
105533 pAAV.CMV.Luc.IRES.EGFP.SV40 Firefly CMV AAV expression of firefly luciferase and GFP James Wilson
22522 phGluc Gaussia EF1α Expression of Gaussia luciferase; GFP is expressed if cells are infected with virus Christopher Buck
98580 pLX304 Luciferase-V5 blast Firefly CMV Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase with a V5 tag Kevin Janes
83281 pAAV-CAG-FLuc Firefly CAG AAV expression of firefly luciferase Mark Kay
105532 pAAV.CMV.ffLuciferase.SV40 Firefly CMV AAV expression of firefly luciferase James Wilson
101156 T7-CMVtrans-FFLuc-polyA Firefly T7 Expression of firefly luciferase from a cell-free mammalian cell lysate Marcel Bruchez
108542 pLenti-EF1a-Luciferase-IRES-Blast-WPRE Firefly EF1α Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase Javier Alcudia
113442 pcDNA3.1 NL NanoLuc® CMV Mammalian expression of Nanoluc with a N-terminal Myc tag Erich Wanker
124701 pLenti-PGK-Venus-Akaluc (neo) Akaluc hPGK Lentiviral expression of Venus-Aka-luciferase Roland Friedel
120798 pRRL Luciferase Firefly hPGK Lentiviral expression of firefly luciferase Paul Khavari
102320 FUW-RLuc-T2A-PuroR Renilla Ubc Lentiviral Expression of Renilla luciferase Rudolf Jaenisch
113450 pLenti NL NanoLuc® Ubc Lentiviral expression of Nanoluc with a N-terminal Myc tag Erich Wanker
115352 pFL-SV40 Firefly SV40 Mammalian expression of firefly luciferase Ming-Chih Lai
100984 pGL4.18 CMV-Luc Firefly CMV Mammalian expression of firefly luciferase Lee Helman
131860 pZmUBQ:LUC Firefly ZmUBQ Plant expression of firefly luciferase from the Zea mays ubiquitin promoter. Paul Schulze-Lefert
83282 pAAV-CAG-RLuc Renilla CAG AAV expression of Renilla luciferase Mark Kay
83280 pscAAV-CAG-RLuc Renilla CAG Vector for packaging self-complementary AAV expressing Renilla luciferase Mark Kay
140328 pLenti-PGK-Venus-Fluc (puro) Firefly hPGK Lentiviral expression of Venus-firefly luciferase Roland Friedel
170575 pCMV-FLuc Firefly CMV Retroviral expression of firefly luciferase David Nemazee
68216 pEGB 35S:Luciferase:Tnos (GB0110) Firefly 35S Transcriptional unit for firefly luciferase expression in plants (GoldenBraid 2.0). Diego Orzaez
68215 pEGB 35S:Renilla:Tnos (GB0109) Renilla 35S Transcriptional unit for Renilla luciferase expression in plants (GoldenBraid 2.0). Diego Orzaez
118069 MLRV Multiple Multiple Multi-luciferase reporter vector including five transcriptional reporters for NF-kb, TGF-b, c-Myc, p53, and MAPK/JNK plus a constitutive control. Koen Venken
133315 pMKV060 Firefly AtUbi10 BeYDV replicon on T-DNA backbone expressing firefly luc for monitoring plant transfection. Daniel Voytas
133312 pMKV057 Firefly AtUbi10 BeYDV replicon on T-DNA backbone expressing WUS2 and IPT, with firefly luc for monitoring plant transfection. Daniel Voytas
181934 pC0037 Gaussia, Cypridina EF1α, CMV Dual secreted luciferase reporter (EF1α-Gaussia luciferase, CMV-Cypridina luciferase). Feng Zhang

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Reporter Constructs

Already know what gene or regulatory element that you need a luciferase reporter for? Browse or use the search box to find a construct that contains your regulatory element of interest.

ID Plasmid Description Gene/Insert PI

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Do you have suggestions for other plasmids that should be added to this list?

Fill out our Suggest a Plasmid form or e-mail [email protected] to help us improve this resource!