plasma membrane-selective permeabilization?

[Dr E. Buxbaum]

gst3 at york.ac.uk wrote:
>Hi, 
>I'd be very grateful if anybody could point me in the direction of techniques  to 
>specifically permeabilize plasma membranes in cultured mammalian cells whilst 
>leaving as much else  (mito, lysosomes etc) unaffected.

The detergent digitonin will do exactly that. It binds preferentialy to 
membranes containing cholesterol, i.e. the cell membrane.