Avian transgenesis: progress towards the promise.
The hen has long held promise as a low cost, high-yield bioreactor for the production of human biopharmaceuticals in egg whites. A typical egg white contains 3.5-4.0 grams of protein, more than half of which comes from a single gene (ovalbumin). Harnessing the power of the gene to express a recombinant protein could yield up to a gram or more of the protein in the naturally sterile egg. Accordingly, a major effort has been underway for more than a decade to develop robust methods for modification of the chicken genome. This effort intensified in the mid-1990s when several avian transgenic companies entered the scene. Progress has been made in that time but much remains to be done.
Ivarie
Robert
R
Department of Genetics, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, 30602-7223, USA. ivarie@arches.uga.edu
D000818:Animals; D001755:Blastocyst / Q000378:metabolism; D002642:Chick Embryo; D002645:Chickens; D003593:Cytoplasm / Q000378:metabolism; D018014:Gene Transfer Techniques; D005821:Genetic Techniques; D016678:Genome; D012190:Retroviridae / Q000235:genetics; D013234:Stem Cells / Q000166:cytology; D019076:Transgenes