Functional biosynthesis of an allophycocyan beta subunit in Escherichia coli

Allophycocyanin is a phycobiliprotein with various biological and pharmacological properties. An expression vector was constructed using CpeS as the bilin lyase for the allophycocyanin β subunit, resulting in overexpression of a fluorescent allophycocyanin β-subunit in Escherichia coli. A high-density cell culture was developed using a continuous feeding strategy. After 16 h of culture, the dry cell density reached 21.4 g l− 1, the expression of the allophycocyanin β-subunit was 0.86 g l− 1 broth, and the relative chromoprotein yield was 81.4%. The recombinant protein showed spectral features similar to native allophycocyanin, which provide an efficient methodology for large-scale production of this valuable fluorescent protein.