Budded baculoviruses as a tool for a homogeneous fluorescence anisotropy-based assay of ligand binding to G protein-coupled receptors: The case of melanocortin 4 receptors

Illustrative scheme of MC4 receptor budded baculovirus preparation strategy. Budded baculoviruses are produced during the insect cell infection cycle as nucleocapsids bud from the cell surface. Rod-shaped viruses, which are surrounded by a double lipid bilayer that is derived directly from the host cell surface and that carries membrane proteins from that surface (including expressed MC4 receptors), were collected and subsequently concentrated from supernatant fraction.413