Engineering Escherichia coli for Effective Expression of Plant Genes

Abstract

Various plant-derived useful chemicals have been used for human from ancient to modern time. Because of difference of genetic characters between bacteria and plant, it could cause low plant protein expression or formation of inclusion body composed by insoluble protein precipitates. There are generally two methods for enhancement of heterologous protein expression in E. coli. In order to change rare tRNA abundance and chaperone expression level, we conducted chromosomally integrated promoter mutant libraries using recombination with single-strand DNA oligonucleotides. Some chaperone promoter mutants showed enhancement of Arabidopsis’s protein expression level. The tRNA and chaperone promoter mutants also showed significant increases in target Arabidopsis’s protein expression. We developed E. coli mutants for optimal plant protein expression. It is applicable to pharmaceutical production of plant-derived useful chemicals from E. coli.