Improving the productivity of single-chain Fv antibody against c-Met by rearranging the order of its variable domains

J Microbiol Biotechnol. 2008 Jun;18(6):1186-90.

Abstract

Single-chain Fv (scFv) antibody against c-Met is expected to be employed in clinical treatment or imaging of cancer cells owing to the important biological roles of c-Met in the proliferation of malignancies. Here, we show that the productivity of scFv against c-Met in Escherichia coli is significantly influenced by the orientation of its variable domains. We generated anti-c-Met scFv antibodies with two different domain orders (i.e., VL-linker-VH and VH-linker-VL), expressed them in the cytoplasm of E. coli trx/ gor deleted mutant, and compared their specific activities as well as their productivities. Productivity of total and functional anti-c-Met scFv with VH/VL orientation was more than five times higher than that with VL/VH format. Coexpression of DsbC enhanced the yield of soluble amounts of anti-c-Met scFv protein for both constructs. The purified scFv antibodies of the two different formats exhibited almost the same antigen-binding activities. We also compared the productivities and specific activities of anti-c-Met diabodies with VH/VL or VL/VH formats and obtained similar results to the case of scFv antibodies.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Antibodies, Bispecific / immunology
  • Antibodies, Neoplasm / immunology
  • Antibody Affinity
  • Cloning, Molecular
  • Escherichia coli / genetics
  • Escherichia coli / immunology
  • Humans
  • Immunoglobulin Fragments / immunology*
  • Immunoglobulin Heavy Chains / immunology
  • Immunoglobulin Light Chains / immunology
  • Immunoglobulin Variable Region / immunology*
  • Protein Engineering*
  • Protein Structure, Tertiary
  • Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-met / immunology*
  • Structure-Activity Relationship
  • Substrate Specificity

Substances

  • Antibodies, Bispecific
  • Antibodies, Neoplasm
  • Immunoglobulin Fragments
  • Immunoglobulin Heavy Chains
  • Immunoglobulin Light Chains
  • Immunoglobulin Variable Region
  • immunoglobulin Fv
  • Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-met