Use of glycol ethers for selective release of periplasmic proteins from Gram-negative bacteria.

Genetic modification of Gram-negative bacteria to express a desired protein within the cell's periplasmic space, located between the inner cytoplasmic membrane and the outer cell wall, can offer an attractive strategy for commercial production of therapeutic proteins and industrial enzymes. In certain applications, the product expression rate is high, and the ability to isolate the product from the cell mass is greatly enhanced because of the product's compartmentalized location within the cell. Protein release methods that increase the permeability of the outer cell wall for primary recovery, but avoid rupturing the inner cell membrane, reduce contamination of the recovered product with other host cell components and simplify final purification. This article reports representative data for a new release method employing glycol ether solvents. The example involves the use of 2-butoxyethanol (commonly called ethylene glycol n-butyl ether or EB) for selective release of a proprietary biopharmaceutical protein produced in the periplasmic space of Pseudomonas fluorescens. In this example, glycol ether treatment yielded approximately 65% primary recovery with approximately 80% purity on a protein-only basis. Compared with other methods including heat treatment, osmotic shock, and the use of surfactants, the glycol ether treatment yielded significantly reduced concentrations of other host cell proteins, lipopolysaccharide endotoxin, and DNA in the recovered protein solution. The use of glycol ethers also allowed exploitation of temperature-change-induced phase splitting behavior to concentrate the desired product. Heating the aqueous EB extract solution to 55 degrees C formed two liquid phases: a glycol ether-rich phase and an aqueous product phase containing the great majority of the product protein. This phase-splitting step yielded an approximate 10-fold reduction in the volume of the initial product solution and a corresponding increase in the product's concentration.

Selective release of calpain produced alphalI-spectrin (alpha-fodrin) breakdown products by acute neuronal cell death.

Activation of calpain results in the breakdown of alpha II spectrin (alpha-fodrin), a neuronal cytoskeleton protein, which has previously been detected in various in vitro and in vivo neuronal injury models. In this study, a 150 kDa spectrin breakdown product (SBDP150) was found to be released into the cell-conditioned media from SH-SY5Y cells treated with the calcium channel opener maitotoxin (MTX). SBDP150 release can be readily quantified on immunoblot using an SBDP150-specific polyclonal antibody. Increase of SBDP150 also correlated with cell death in a time-dependent manner. MDL28170, a selective calpain inhibitor, was the only protease inhibitor tested that significantly reduced MTX-induced SBDP150 release. The cell-conditioned media of cerebellar granule neurons challenged with excitotoxins (NMDA and kainate) also exhibited a significant increase of SBDP150 that was attenuated by pretreatment with an NMDA receptor antagonist, R(-)-3-(2-carbopiperazine-4-yl)-propyl-1-phosphonic acid (CPP), and MDL28170. In addition, hypoxic/hypoglycemic challenge of cerebrocortical cultures also resulted in SBDP150 liberation into the media. These results support the theory that an antibody-based detection of SBDP150 in the cell-conditioned media can be utilized to quantify injury to neural cells. Furthermore, SBDP150 may potentially be used as a surrogate biomarker for acute neuronal injury in clinical settings.