Abstract
Pinellia ternata agglutinin (PTA) from the tubers of P. ternata is a monocot mannose-binding lectin that catalytically agglutinated rabbit erythrocytes. The potential effect of PTA has gained considerable interest in recent years owing to clinical use of native PTA as the preparation against cancer and for plant protection against insect pests. Here we report a successful strategy to allow high-level expression of PTA as inclusion bodies in Escherichia coli M15. Purification of refolded recombinant protein from solubilized inclusion bodies by Ni-NTA agarose affinity chromatography yielded biological activity recombinant PTA (final yield of about 10 mg/L). The recombinant PTA agglutinated rabbit erythrocytes to a dilution similar to that determined for “native” lectin purified from P. ternata. The expression and purification system makes it possible to obtain sufficient quantities of biologically active and homogenous recombinant PTA sufficient to carry out advanced clinical trials. This is the first report on the large-scale expression and purification of biologically active recombinant PTA from E. coli.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Van Damme, E. J. M., Allen, A. K., and Peumans, W. J. (1987) Isolation and characterization of a lectin with exclusive specificity towards mannose from snowdrop (Galanthus nivalis) bulbs. FEBS Lett. 215, 140–144.
Shibuya, N., Goldstein, I. J., Van Damme, E. J. M., and Peumans, W. J. (1988) Binding properties of a mannose-specific lectin from the snowdrop (Galanthus nivalis) bulbs. J. Biol. Chem. 263, 728–734.
Van Damme, E. J. M., Goldstein, I. J., and Peumans, W. J. (1991) A comparative study of mannose-binding lectins from the Amaryllidaceae and Alliaceae. Phytochemistry 30, 509–514.
Annick, B., Van Damme, E. J. M., Willy, J. P., and Pierre, R. (1996) Structure-function relationship of monocot mannose-binding lectins. Plant Physiol. 112, 1531–1540.
Van Damme, E. J. M., Karine, G., Koen, S., Fred, V. L. N., Peter, V., and Peumans, W. J. (1995) The major tuber storage protein of Araceae species is a lectin. Plant Physiol. 107, 1147–1158.
Van Damme, E. J. M., Smeets, K., and Peumans, W. J. (1995). The mannose-binding monocot lectins and their genes. In Lectins: Biomedical Perspectives, Pusztai, A. and Bardocz, S., eds., Taylor and Francis, London, pp. 59–80.
Peumans, W. J., Smeets, K., Van Nerum, K., Van Leuven, F., and Van Damme, E. J. M. (1997). Lectin and alliinase are the predominant proteins in the nectar from leek (Allium porrum) flowers. Planta 201, 298–302.
Van Damme, E. J. M., Willy, J. P., Annick, B., and Pierre, R. (1998) Plant lectins: a composite of several distinct families of structurally and evolutionary related proteins with diverse biological roles. Crit. Rev. Plant Sci. 17, 575–692.
Saito, K., Komae, A., Kakuta, M., et al. (1993) The alpha-mannosyl-binding lectin from leaves of the orchild twayblade (Listera ovata): application to separation of α-D-mannans from α-D-glucans. Eur. J. Biochem. 217, 677–681.
Balzarini, J., Neyts, J., Schols, D., et al. (1992) The mannose-specific plant lectins from Cymbidium hybrid and Epipactis helleborine and the (N-acetylglucosamine)-specific plant lectin from Uutica dioica are potent and selective inhibitors of human immunodeficiency virus and cytomegalovirus replication in vitro. Antiviral Res. 18, 191–207.
Pusztai, A., Grant, G., Spencer, R., et al. (1993) Kidney bean lectin-induced E. coli overgrowth in the small intestine is blocked by GNA, a mannose-specific lectin. J. Appl. Bacteriol. 75, 360–368.
Powell, K. S., Gatehouse, A. M. R., and Hilder, V. A. (1995) Antifeedant effects of plant lectins and an enzyme on the adult stage of the rice brown planthopper, Nilaparvata lugens. Entomol. Exp. Appl. 75, 51–59.
Pan, Y. H., Zhang, S. X., Chao, J. P., et al. (1998) Study on isolation, purification of lectin from Pinellia ternata and activity of against aphids. Nat. Sci. Prog. 8, 502–505.
Hilder, V. A., Powell, K. S., Gatehouse, A. M. R., et al. (1995) Expression of snowdrop lectin in transgenic tobacco plants results in added protection against aphids. Transgenic Res. 4, 18–25.
Rao, K. V., Rathore, K. S., Hodges, T. K., et al. (1998) Expression of snowdrop lectin (GNA) in transgenic rice plants confers resistance to rice brown planthopper. Plant J. 15, 469–477.
Tao, Z. J., Xu, Q. Y., Wu, K. Z., Lian, S. H., and Sun, D. (1981) Isolation, crystallization, biological activities and some chemical characteristics of pinellin. Acta Biochimica Biophysica Sin. 13, 77–82.
Sun, G. X., Ding, S. G., and Qian, Y. J. (1995) Purification and characterization of Pinellia pedatisecta lectin A. J. Shanghai Med. Univ. 22, 299–302.
Wang, K. Y. and Guo, M. (1993) Purification of lectin from Pinellia ternata Chinese Biochem. J. 9, 545–548.
Wang, K. Y., Tao, Z. J., Wu, K. Z., et al. (1981) The carbohydrate binding specificity of pinellia lectin. Acta Biochimica Biphysica Sin. 13, 423–425.
Yao, J. H., Sun, X. F., and Tang, K. X. (2001) Molecular cloning of lectin gene from Pinellia ternate. J. Fudan Univ. 40, 461–464.
Sun, G. X., Ding, S. G., and Qian, Y. J. (1992) The extraction and chemical analysis of proteins from Pinellia pedatisecta and their inhibitory effects on the mouse sarcoma-180. J. Shanghai Med. Univ. 19, 17–20.
Zhu, M. W., Zhou, K. M., and Ding, S. S. (1999) Total proteins of Pinellia pedatisecta effects in ovarian cancer cell lines and human umbilical cord blood hematopoietic progenitors. J. Shanghai Med. Univ. 26, 455–458.
Huang, D. F., Pan, Y. H., Zhang, S. X., et al. (1997) The discovery of insecticidal protein against aphids from Pinellia pedatisecta and P. termata Scientia Agri. Sin. 30, 94–96.
Sambrook, J., Fritsch, E. F., and Maniatis, T. (1989) Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Cold Spring Harbor, NY.
Peterson, G. L. (1977) A simplification of protein assay method of Lowry et al., which is more generally applicable. Anal. Biochem. 83, 346–356.
Longstaff, M., Powell, K. S., Gatehouse, J. A., Raemaekers, R., Newell, C. A., and Hamilton, W. D. O. (1998) Production and purification of active snowdrop lectin in Escherichia coli Eur. J. Biochem. 252, 59–65.
Van Heijine, G. A. (1986) New method for predicting signal sequence cleavage sites. Nucl. Acids Res. 14, 4683–4690.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Lin, J., Yao, J., Zhou, X. et al. Expression and purification of a novel mannose-binding lectin from Pinellia ternata . Mol Biotechnol 25, 215–221 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1385/MB:25:3:215
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1385/MB:25:3:215