An alternative method of enhancing the expression level of heterologous protein in Escherichia coli

Though numerous strategy options are available for achieving high expression levels of genes in Escherichia coli, not every gene can be efficiently expressed in this organism. By investigating the relationship between the mRNA secondary structure of translational initiation region (TIR) and gene expression in E.coli, we establish a simple method to design sequences of appropriate TIR (from −35 to +36) that meet a specific expression level as we need. Using this method, overexpression of native human humor necrosis factor α and extracellular domain of Her2/neu protein (aa 23-146) in E. coli were achieved. Differences in expression appeared was mainly related to the efficiency of translation initiation and the stability of mRNA secondary structure, because the intracellular mRNA levels analyzed by real-time RT-PCR were quite similar. Our approach can overcome the steric hindrance of translation startup, and therefore promote translation smoothly to acquire high expression of exogenous protein.