Recent advances in the expression of foreign genes in Pichia pastoris.

ABSTRACT

The Pichia pastoris heterologous gene expression system has been utilized to produce attractive levels of a variety of intracellular and extracellular proteins of interest. Recent advances in our understanding and application of the system have improved its utility even further. These advances include (1) methods for the construction of P. pastoris strains with multiple copies of AOX1-promoter-driven expression cassettes; (2) mixed-feed culture strategies for high foreign protein volumetric productivity rates; (3) methods to reduce proteolysis of some products in high cell-density culture media; (4) tested procedures for purification of secreted products; and (5) detailed information on the structures of N-linked oligosaccharides on P. pastoris secreted proteins. In this review, these advances along with basic features of the P. pastoris system are described and discussed.