Expression and purification of biologically active recombinant quail stem cell factor in E. coli

Stem cell factor (SCF) is a multifunctional cytokine involved in hematopoiesis, melanogenesis and gametogenesis. Previous studies have demonstrated that avian SCF is a requirement for the proliferation and survival of various cell types in vivo and in vitro. In the current study, recombinant quail stem cell factor was produced in Escherichia coli using a prokaryotic expression system. SCF was expressed as a fusion protein with a histidine hexamer tag at the N-terminal end of the protein. Following expression, the protein was purified by affinity chromatography on the Ni-NTA column. The uninduced and induced protein lysates and the purified protein were separated by SDS-PAGE and transferred onto nitrocellulose membrane. Western blot analysis with the monoclonal antibody to the histidine tag identified SCF in the induced cell lysates and the purified sample. The recombinant SCF was approximately 22-23 kD in size. This protein was generated devoid of the signal peptide, the transmembrane domain, and the intracellular domain and, hence, resembles the soluble form of SCF. Biological activity was assayed using the in vitro survival of E12 chicken dorsal root ganglion-derived sensory neurons. The addition of recombinant quail SCF improved neuronal survival. Survival (20.6%) was the highest at the 50 ng/ml concentration of SCF. The availability of quail SCF will be a valuable tool to further resolve the function of stem cell factor in birds.     

High yield expression of recombinant pro-resilin: lactose-induced fermentation in E. coli and facile purification

Resilin is an elastic protein with outstanding material properties: high resilience and a very high fatigue lifetime. We are interested in the production of resilin-like proteins which can be photo-chemically cross-linked to form rubbery biomaterials to be used in a variety of industrial and medicinal applications. A method has been developed for producing soluble recombinant proteins in small scale fermentation equipment using glycerol batch for initial growth and primary induction by IPTG at carbon source depletion, followed by new growth in lactose-induced culture. Recombinant rec1-resilin has been over-expressed in the host strain Escherichia coli BL21(DE3)pLysS at a level of up to 300 mg/l, a greater than 20-fold increase in volumetric productivity, relative to that obtained from conventional IPTG induction in LB medium. The primary induction step before lactose induction in fresh medium resulted in a 2.5- to 3-fold increase of both volumetric productivity and cell specific yield compared to that without primary induction under the same conditions. This method is amenable and suitable for large scale production of soluble resilin-like proteins at a low operating cost. In addition, a simple 'salt precipitation and heat purification' method allowed rapid and efficient downstream processing of a large quantity of soluble recombinant resilin-like proteins. These methods will enable investigation of the structural and functional properties of resilin-like proteins, and the development of highly resilient biomaterials.     

Differential precipitation and zinc chelate chromatography purification of biologically active HTLV-I Tax1 expressed in E. coli

A protocol which involves sequential ammonium sulfate precipitation and zinc chelate chromatography to purify the HTLV-I Tax1 protein expressed in E. coli is described. The final Tax1 product is greater than 90% pure and the yield is approximately 1 mg per liter of liquid culture. The purified Tax1 protein is biologically active in indirect in vitro DNA binding assays and cellular NF-kB induction experiments.     

High yield refolding and purification process for recombinant human interleukin-6 expressed in Escherichia coli

Recombinant human interleukin-6 (hIL-6), a pleiotropic cytokine containing two intramolecular disulfide bonds, was expressed in Escherichia coli as an insoluble inclusion body, before being refolded and purified in high yield providing sufficient qualities for clinical use. Quantitative reconstitution of the native disulfide bonds of hIL-6 from the fully denatured E. coli extracts could be performed by glutathione-assisted oxidation in a completely denaturating condition (6M guanidinium chloride) at protein concentrations higher than 1 mg/mL, preventing aggregation of reduced hIL-6. Oxidation in 6M guanidinium chloride (GdnHCl) required remarkably low concentrations of glutathione (reduced form, 0.01 mM; oxidized form, 0.002 mM) to be added to the solubilized hIL-6 before the incubation at pH 8.5, and 22 degrees C for 16 h. After completion of refolding by rapid transfer of oxidized hIL-6 into acetate buffer by gel filtration chromatography, residual contaminants including endotoxin and E. coli proteins were efficiently removed by successive steps of chromatography. The amount of dimeric hIL-6s, thought to be purification artifacts, was decreased by optimizing the salt concentrations of the loading materials in the ion-exchange chromatography, and gradually removing organic solvents from the collected fractions of the preparative reverse-phase HPLC. These refolding and purification processes, which give an overall yield as high as 17%, seem to be appropriate for the commercial scale production of hIL-6 for therapeutic use.     

High level expression and simple purification of recombinant human granulocyte colony-stimulating factor in E. coli

Summary A human granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (hG-CSF) gene was synthesized and inserted into a trp expression vector for over-expression in E. coli. A strong expression vector was constructed, and a simple purification procedure including in vitro refolding was established. The final productivity of hG-CSF was 500~600mg per l culture, and the purified hG-CSF showed the proliferation of neutrophils in vivo assays.     

大肠杆菌表达的重组hIL-4的分离纯化

对大肠杆菌表达的重组人白细胞介素 4进行了分离纯化。人 IL- 4基因表达产物在大肠杆菌中以不溶性包含体形式存在 ,经过超声破菌、包含体抽提、洗涤处理 ,可使包含体纯度达 70 %以上 ,用 6mol/L盐酸胍变性溶解包含体沉淀后上清直接稀释复性 ,再经浓缩、透析、离子交换色谱一系列纯化步骤终产物纯度达 95 %以上 ,回收率 1 0 %以上 ,比活性达 2 .5× 1 0 6U/mg     

中性白细胞抑制因子在大肠杆菌中的表达与纯化

利用PCR技术扩增编码钩虫中性白细胞抑制因子(NIF)成熟肽的cDNA,克隆于表达载体pET-21a( )。序列分析表明与献报道一致。经IPTG诱导,在大肠杆菌BL21(DE3)plys中实现高效可溶性表达。SDS—PAGE分析结果表明,外源蛋白(相对分子质量28900)约占全菌蛋白的20％。菌体用溶菌酶处理。上清经Q—Sepharose FF阴离子交换、羟基磷灰石层析、Sephacryl S-100凝胶过滤,得到纯度约95％的重组NIF。活性测定结果表明,大肠杆菌表达的重组NIF能有效地抑制中性白细胞粘附。这些结果为利用大肠杆菌制备重组NIF奠定了基础。     

Generation of von Willebrand factor epitope libraries expressed in E. coli

The von Willebrand factor (VWF) subunit is composed of several domains, often coinciding with structural regions, characterized through their specific interaction with a ligand. Since several monoclonal antibodies (MoAbs) have been shown to functionally interfere with one of the specific interactions, we have created libraries of bacterial clones expressing peptidic sequences of VWF to map antibodies directed against this protein. Randomly cleaved fragments of VWF cDNA have been cloned in a plasmid designed for the expression of small peptides as part of larger fusion proteins. The NovaTope system is a useful procedure for protein analysis, allowing screening of epitopes composed of contiguous amino acid residues. To map MoAbs with conformational discontinuous epitopes displayed on small as well as large peptidic domains, this technique had to be widely modified to obtain two VWF peptide libraries expressing two ranges of peptide length (15-70 and 100-300 amino acids). Screening with six MoAbs with an epitope in a known region was performed to control both libraries. Four MoAbs were mapped through the characterization of overlapping sequences for 5-10 different positively expressed clones respectively. Two of these mapped MoAbs had no known inhibitory effect and bind reduced VWF only. The fact that the two other MoAbs mapped VWF functional interactions with ligands, platelet GPIIb/IIIa and Factor VIII, respectively, demonstrate that our libraries are valuable tools to determine conformational epitopes.     

Improved yield of a ligand-binding GPCR expressed in E. coli for structural studies

The G-protein coupled receptor (GPCR), rat brain neurotensin receptor type I (NTS1) is one of a small number of GPCRs that have been successfully expressed in Escherichia coli as a functional, ligand-binding receptor, but yields of purified receptor are still low for comprehensive structural studies. Here, several approaches have been examined to optimize the yields of active, ligand-binding receptor. Optimisation of E. coli strain and induction protocol yielded a significant improvement in expression of active receptor. Expression of the receptor in BL21(DE3) cells, in combination with autoinduction improved expression 10-fold when compared with previously reported expression protocols using IPTG-mediated induction in DH5alpha cells. Optimization of the purification protocol revealed that supplementation of buffers with phospholipids enhanced recovery of active receptor. The methods examined are potentially applicable to other GPCRs expressed in E. coli.     

Use of polymeric membranes for purification of an E. coli expressed biotherapeutic protein

Polymers have had a significant impact on the field of bioseparations in the past few decades. Most recently, membrane chromatography has emerged as an efficient alternative to the conventional packed-bed chromatography by eliminating the diffusion-related limitations associated with the traditional resin beads. In this article, we examine six membrane adsorbers for purification of granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (GCSF), an Escherichia coli-based biotherapeutic. These adsorbers differ either in their base matrix or in the surface chemistry. The role of interactions between the filter surfaces and the protein molecules in effecting these separations is the focus of the article.     

Intein-mediated protein purification of fusion proteins expressed under high-cell density conditions in E. coli

The intein-mediated purification system has the potential to significantly reduce the recovery costs of industrial recombinant proteins. The ability of inteins to catalyze a controllable peptide bond cleavage reaction can be used to separate a recombinant protein from its affinity tag during affinity purification. Inteins have been combined with a chitin-binding domain to serve as a self-cleaving affinity tag, facilitating highly selective capture of the fusion protein on an inexpensive substrate--chitin (IMPACT) system, New England Biolabs, Beverly, MA). This purification system has been used successfully at a lab scale in low cell density cultures, but has not been examined comprehensively under high-cell density conditions in defined medium. In this study, the intein-mediated purification of three commercially relevant proteins expressed under high-cell density conditions in E. coli was studied. Additionally, losses during the purification process were quantified. The data indicate that the intein fusion proteins expressed under high cell density fermentations were stable in vivo after induction for a significant duration, and the intein fusion proteins could undergo thiol or pH and temperature initiated cleavage reaction in vitro. Thus, the intein-mediated protein purification system potentially could be employed for the production of recombinant proteins at the industrial-scale.