Modifying the Replication of Geminiviral Vectors Reduces Cell Death and Enhances Expression of Biopharmaceutical Proteins in Nicotiana benthamiana Leaves.

ABSTRACT: Plants are a promising platform to produce biopharmaceutical proteins, however, the toxic nature of some proteins inhibits their accumulation. We previously created a replicating geminiviral expression system based on bean yellow dwarf virus (BeYDV) that enables very high-level production of recombinant proteins. To study the role of replication in this system, we generated vectors that allow separate and controlled expression of BeYDV Rep and RepA proteins. We show that the ratio of Rep and RepA strongly affects the efficiency of replication. Rep, RepA, and vector replication all elicit the plant hypersensitive response, resulting in cell death. We find that a modest reduction in expression of Rep and RepA reduces plant leaf cell death which, despite reducing the accumulation of viral rep

SUBMITTER: Diamos AG 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6333858 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature