The effect of carbon source on the secretome of Kluyveromyces lactis.

A proteomic analysis was performed on spent fermentation medium following bioreactor propagation of a wild-type industrial strain to identify proteins naturally secreted by Kluyveromyces lactis cells. Here, we report changes detected in the K. lactis secretome as a result of growth in three different carbon sources: glucose, galactose and glycerol. A total of 151 secreted proteins were detected by multi-dimensional separations and reversed-phase online nanoESI-MS/MS analysis. From these, we were able to identify 63 proteins (termed the "base secretome") that were common to all three fermentation conditions. The majority of base secretome proteins, 79%, possessed general secretory pathway (GSP) sequences and were involved with cell wall structure, glycosylation, carbohydrate metabolism and proteolysis. There was little variation in the functional groupings of base secretome GSP proteins and GSP proteins that were not part of the base secretome. In contrast, the majority of non-GSP proteins detected were not part of the base secretome and the functions of these proteins varied significantly. Finally, through further identification of non-GSP proteins in carbon sources not originally tested, we have gained further evidence of a protein export mechanism separate from the GSP in K. lactis.

Physical and computational analysis of the yeast Kluyveromyces lactis secreted proteome.

Secretion of proteins is the most common approach to protein expression in Kluyveromyces lactis. A proteomic analysis was performed on spent fermentation medium following bioreactor propagation of a wild-type industrial strain to identify proteins naturally secreted by K. lactis cells. Multidimensional separations were conducted and RP online ESI-MS/MS analysis identified 81 secreted proteins. In addition, an in silico analysis predicted 178 K. lactis proteins to be secreted via the general secretory pathway (GSP). These two datasets were compared and approximately 70% of the K. lactis proteins detected in the culture medium possessed a GSP sequence. The detected proteins included those involved with cell wall structure and synthesis, carbohydrate metabolism, and proteolysis, a result that may have significant bearing on heterologous protein expression. Additionally, both the experimental and in silico datasets were compared to similar, previously published datasets for Candida albicans. With the methodology presented here, we provide the deepest penetration into a yeast secretome yet reported.

Expression of two recombinant chloramphenicol acetyltransferase variants in highly reduced genome Escherichia coli strains.

Highly reduced E. coli strains, MDS40, MDS41, and MDS42, lacking approximately 15% of the genome, were grown to high cell densities to test their ability to produce a recombinant protein with high yields. These strains lack all transposons and insertion sequences, cryptic prophage and many genes of unknown function. In addition to improving genetic stability, these deletions may reduce the biosynthetic requirements of the cell potentially allowing more efficient production of recombinant protein. Basic growth parameters and the ability of the strains to produce chloramphenicol acetyltransferase (CAT) under high cell density, batch cultivation were assessed. Although growth rate and recombinant protein production of the reduced genome strains are comparable to the parental MG1655 strain, the reduced genome strains were found to accumulate significant amounts of acetate in the medium at the expense of additional biomass. A number of hypotheses were examined to explain the accumulation of acetate, including oxygen limitation, carbon flux imbalance, and metabolic activity of the recombinant protein. Use of a non-catalytic CAT variant identified the recombinant protein activity as the source of this phenomenon; implications for the metabolic efficiency of the reduced genome strains are discussed.

Recombinant protein production in an Escherichia coli reduced genome strain.

Recently, efforts have been made to improve the properties of Escherichia coli as a recombinant host by 'genomic surgery'-deleting large segments of the E. coli K12 MG1655 genome without scars. These excised segments included K-islands, which contain a high proportion of transposons, insertion sequences, cryptic phage, damaged, and unknown-function genes. The resulting multiple-deletion strain, designated E. coli MDS40, has a 14% (about 700 genes) smaller genome than the parent strain, E. coli MG1655. The multiple-deletion and parent E. coli strains were cultured in fed-batch fermenters to high cell densities on minimal medium to simulate industrial conditions for evaluating growth and recombinant protein production characteristics. Recombinant protein production and by-product levels were quantified at different controlled growth rates. These results indicate that the multiple-deletion strain's growth behavior and recombinant protein productivity closely matched the parent stain. Thus, the multiple-deletion strain E. coli MDS40 provides a suitable foundation for further genomic reduction.

Emergent properties of reduced-genome Escherichia coli.

With the use of synthetic biology, we reduced the Escherichia coli K-12 genome by making planned, precise deletions. The multiple-deletion series (MDS) strains, with genome reductions up to 15%, were designed by identifying nonessential genes and sequences for elimination, including recombinogenic or mobile DNA and cryptic virulence genes, while preserving good growth profiles and protein production. Genome reduction also led to unanticipated beneficial properties: high electroporation efficiency and accurate propagation of recombinant genes and plasmids that were unstable in other strains. Eradication of stress-induced transposition evidently stabilized the MDS genomes and provided some of the new properties.

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.

Simulation of large-scale production of a soluble recombinant protein expressed in Escherichia coli using an intein-mediated purification system.

Inteins are self-cleavable proteins that under reducing conditions can be cleaved from a recombinant target protein. Industrially, an intein-based system could potentially reduce production costs of recombinant proteins by facilitating a highly selective affinity purification using an inexpensive substrate such as chitin. In this study, SuperPro Designer was used to simulate the large-scale recovery of a soluble recombinant protein expressed in Escherichia coli using an intein-mediated purification process based on the commercially available IMPACT system. The intein process was also compared with a conventional process simulated by SuperPro. The intein purification process initially simulated was significantly more expensive than the conventional process, primarily owing to the properties of the chitin resin and high reducing-agent (dithiothreitol [DTT]) raw material cost. The intein process was sensitive to the chitin resin binding capacity, cleavage efficiency of the intein fusion protein, the size of the target protein relative to the intein tag, and DTT costs. An optimized intein purification process considerably reduced costs by simulating an improved chitin resin and alternative reducing agents. Thus, to realize the full potential of intein purification processes, research is needed to improve the properties of chitin resin and to find alternative, inexpensive raw materials.