Mempro™ Plant-Based Cytochrome P450 Production

Creative Biostructure can provide unmatched custom Mempro™ cytochrome P450 (CYP) production services using plant system. Our scientists can provide you multiple expression and purification strategies for high-yield production of stable and functional membrane proteins.

The advantages of our Mempro™ plant-based protein production platform are animal-free, low endotoxin, and low protease activity. Most notably, membrane proteins expressed by plant system are free of animal components, serum, endotoxins and antibiotics as well as human or animal infectious agents or other endogenous mammalian contamination. In addition, post-translational modification such as glycosylation and disulfide bonds can be introduced in plant system.

Creative Biostructure can employ various types of host plants to produce animal-free proteins, such as Nicotiana benthamiana (tobacco), Medicago rativa (alfalfa), Arabidopsis thaliana (A. thaliana), potato, maize, barley and lettuce. The significant advantages of plant-based membrane protein production mainly include: cost-effective, high production, easy storage and distribution, friendly environment and free of infectious or toxic contaminants.

CYPs are composed of a superfamily of those proteins containing a hemo cofactor. CYPs can utilize numerous small and large molecules as substrates in enzymatic reactions. The most common reaction catalyzed by CYPs is a monooxygenase reaction. CYPs can be a major source of variability in drug pharmacokinetics and response. Most CYPs locate in the liver and require a protein partner to deliver one or more electrons to reduce the iron. Owing to the the nature of the electron transfer proteins, CYPs can be classified into several groups.

Figure 1. Cytochrome P450 Oxidase (CYP2C9). (Wikipedia)

With the Mempro™ plant-based membrane protein production platform, we are capable of expressing, isolating, purifying and crystallizing CPYs to facilitate the study of their biological functions. Misfolding, aggregation, inactivity, poor stability and solubility, etc. are the common difficulties encountered in cell-based expression system. Strikingly, these difficulties can be bypassed in the renewed plant-based expression system. And animal-free recombinant membrane proteins are particularly important for researchers concerned with experimental variables caused by trace animal components or mammalian pathogens.

Creative Biostructure can also provide Mempro™ plant-based virus-like particles (VLPs) production services. Please feel free to contact us for a detailed quote.

References:
A. Wiktorek-Smagur, et al. (2012). Green way of biomedicine – how to force plants to produce new important proteins. Transgenic Plants-Advances and Limitations, Chapter 3. doi: 10.5772/1409.
Cytochrome P450. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytochrome_P450).
P. Quehl, et al. (2016). Co-expression of active human cytochrome P450 1A2 and cytochrome P450 reductase on the cell surface of Escherichia coli. Microb Cell Fact., 15(1): 26.