Bacterial encapsulins as orthogonal compartments for mammalian cell engineering.

ABSTRACT: We genetically controlled compartmentalization in eukaryotic cells by heterologous expression of bacterial encapsulin shell and cargo proteins to engineer enclosed enzymatic reactions and size-constrained metal biomineralization. The shell protein (EncA) from Myxococcus xanthus auto-assembles into nanocompartments inside mammalian cells to which sets of native (EncB,C,D) and engineered cargo proteins self-target enabling localized bimolecular fluorescence and enzyme complementation. Encapsulation of the enzyme tyrosinase leads to the confinement of toxic melanin production for robust detection via multispectral optoacoustic tomography (MSOT). Co-expression of ferritin-like native cargo (EncB,C) results in efficient iron sequestration producing substantial contrast by magnetic resonance ima

SUBMITTER: Sigmund F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5959871 | biostudies-literature | 2018 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature