I am trying to avoid any chemicals in my lysate of transfected HEK cells because I intend to use the supernatant of the lysate for ELISA. Therefore I wonder if I can use water or PBS alone for cells lysis.
Cell lysis is easiest after swelling them, for example, add 9 volumes of dd water to one volume of cell suspension in PBS. Keep them on ice for 30 min, then give them a few strokes with a Dounce or Potter homogeniser. Ball bearing homogenisers (e.g., http://isobiotec.com/cell-homogenizer.html) also work very well. With some cells, it is even sufficient to pipette them quickly (check with a microscope).