甲型流感病毒核蛋白在大肠杆菌中的可溶性高效表达与纯化

Efficient Soluble Expression and Purification of Influenza A Nucleoprotein in Escherichia coli

为了在大肠杆菌中高效表达甲型流感病毒A/京科/30/95(H3N2)核蛋白NP,以便对原核表达的NP蛋白进行免疫原性研究,本研究通过密码子优化及全基因合成等方法,将3种形式的NP基因:与6×His标签融合的NP基因NP(His)、非融合的野生型NP基因NPwt及非融合的按大肠杆菌优势密码子改造的基因NP(O)分别插入原核表达载体pET-30a,构建了表达3种形式NP基因的3种原核表达质粒并研究不同质粒中NP蛋白的表达形式、条件、纯化工艺及抗原性。限制性酶切反应与测序表明,三种形式的NP基因均正确插入原核表达质粒pET-30a;SDS-PAGE凝胶电泳显示,三种形式的NP基因均能在大肠杆菌中表达,NP(O)基因的表达量最高;在不同温度诱导条件下,NP蛋白呈现可溶性表达,NP(O)基因可溶性高效表达的条件为:T=25℃,t=10 h;经阴离子交换和凝胶过滤层析两步纯化,可溶性表达的NP蛋白纯度可达90%;Western blot检测显示,纯化的NP能与流感病毒A/PR/8/34(H1N1)株感染小鼠的血清发生特异性结合。这些结果表明,非融合表达的密码子优化甲型流感病毒NP蛋白能在大肠杆菌中高效表达和纯化,同时保持良好的免疫反应活性。

To efficiently express nucleoprotein （NP） of influenza A virus A/Jingke/30/95 （H3N2） in E. coli for further immunogenicity study, three forms of NP gene, NP（His） （NP fused with 6×His tag）, NPwt（wild type NP, non-fused NP with native codon） and NP（O） （codon optimized, non-fused NP） were cloned by the technologies of restriction enzyme digestion, PCR, codon optimization and gene synthesis. Three recombinant plasmids were subsequently constructed based on the prokaryotic vector pET-30a, respectively. The comparative studies with these plasmids were carried out on the gene expression efficiency, induction temperature and time, purification process and immune reactivity. It was confirmed by restriction enzyme digestion and sequencing analysis that the three NP genes were inserted into the expression plasmid pET-30a correctly. SDS-PAGE showed that all three forms of NP gene could be efficiently expressed in E. coli, among which NP（O） was expressed with the highest expression level. The lower temperature fermentation （T= 25℃ ） and longer time induction （t= 10 h） were necessary for high-level expres- sion of protein in soluble form. The purity of tag-free NP was up to 90% through the two-step purification process with anion-exchange and gel filtration chromatography. It was indicated by Western blot that purified NP reacted well with the serum from mice immunized with PR8 virus. These results suggest that the codon-optimized influenza A virus NP gene can be efficiently expressed in E. coli and the expressed NP protein with specific immune reactivity could be purified from the supernatant of bacterial lysate.