Expression of a highly antigenic and native-like folded extracellular domain of the human α1 subunit of muscle nicotinic acetylcholine receptor, suitable for use in antigen specific therapies for Myasthenia Gravis.
oleh: Athanasios Niarchos, Marios Zouridakis, Vassilis Douris, Assimina Georgostathi, Dimitra Kalamida, Alexandros Sotiriadis, Konstantinos Poulas, Kostas Iatrou, Socrates J Tzartos
| Format: | Article |
|---|---|
| Diterbitkan: | Public Library of Science (PLoS) 2013-01-01 |
Deskripsi
We describe the expression of the extracellular domain of the human α1 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) in lepidopteran insect cells (i-α1-ECD) and its suitability for use in antigen-specific therapies for Myasthenia Gravis (MG). Compared to the previously expressed protein in P. pastoris (y-α1-ECD), i-α1-ECD had a 2-fold increased expression yield, bound anti-nAChR monoclonal antibodies and autoantibodies from MG patients two to several-fold more efficiently and resulted in a secondary structure closer to that of the crystal structure of mouse α1-ECD. Our results indicate that i-α1-ECD is an improved protein for use in antigen-specific MG therapeutic strategies.