Towards molecular farming in the future: Pichia pastoris-based production of single-chain antibody fragments

• Published in: Biotechnology and applied biochemistry 1999-10, Vol.30 (2), p.117-120
• Main Authors: Fischer, Rainer, Drossard, Jürgen, Emans, Neil, Commandeur, Ulrich, Hellwig, Stephan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Biological and medical sciences; Biotechnology; Cloning, Molecular; Escherichia coli; Fermentation; Forecasting; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Immunoglobulin Fragments - genetics; Immunoglobulin Fragments - metabolism; Methods. Procedures. Technologies; Microbial engineering. Fermentation and microbial culture technology; Pichia - genetics; Pichia - metabolism; Pichia pastoris; Protein Engineering - methods; Protein Engineering - trends; Recombinant Proteins - genetics; Recombinant Proteins - metabolism; Selection, Genetic; Transformation, Genetic
• ISSN: 0885-4513; 1470-8744
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1470-8744.1999.tb00901.x

This review article focuses on the use of the methylotrophic yeast Pichia pastoris as a recombinant protein‐expression system. P. pastoris is a useful system for the expression of milligram‐to‐gram quantities of a protein, which can be scaled up to fermentation to meet greater demands. Compared with mammalian cells, Pichia do not require a complex growth medium or culture conditions, they are as easy to manipulate genetically as Escherichia coli and have a eukaryotic protein‐synthesis pathway. They seem suited to laboratory‐scale production of recombinant proteins for in‐house use or, in some cases, molecular farming of recombinant products. This review article focuses on the use of P. pastoris, describes a fermentation production run of a single‐chain antibody fragment and includes a discussion of fermentation as a production strategy.