SUMO-based protein expression systems

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LifeSensors’ SUMO-based expression systems maximise the yield of soluble, functional proteins in E. coli, yeast, insect and mammalian cells. The systems feature SUMO functioning as both a chaperonin and as an initiator of protein folding to improve the solubility and level of expression of the user’s protein of interest. Desumoylases efficiently and precisely remove SUMO tags, releasing the protein with the desired N-terminal amino acid. Both the SUMO tags and the desumoylases have His6 tags, making their subsequent removal fast and easy.

The E. coli system uses bacterial expression - the usual starting point for expression of heterologous proteins. Bacterial fermentations are inexpensive and can reach high cell densities, resulting in high volumetric yields of the target protein. The company’s SUMO fusion technology is suited to this system.

Mammalian cell expression is suitable for the production of complex, glycosylated biotherapeutic proteins such as antibodies, growth factors and fertility hormones. The SUMOstar system has been designed for transient transfection studies in HEK293 or CHO cells.

Baculovirus/insect cell systems have found wide application for the expression of highly recalcitrant proteins such as protein tyrosine kinases. A SUMOstar-based system supports expression studies in this system.

Yeast offer relatively inexpensive growth media and high density fermentation. Yeast offer the capability of carrying out limited post-translational modifications such as disulfide bond formation and glycosylation. LifeSensors offers two yeast expression systems, one for intracellular expression in S. cerevisiae and the second for extracellular expression in P. pastoris.

The systems provide production in prokaryotes and eukaryotes and are scalable platforms for industrial and commercial manufacturing.