title: Production of functional native human interleukin-2 in tobacco chloroplasts.
abstract: Interleukin-2 (IL-2) is an important T lymphocyte-derived cytokine in the mammalian immune system. Non-native, recombinant IL-2 derived from Escherichia coli is used widely in both medical research and treatment of diseases. Recombinant human IL-2 gene has been expressed in plant nuclear genomes, therefore it can be spread to the environment through pollen. Furthermore, all the plant-produced IL-2 reported thus far had been attached with artificial tags or fusion proteins, which may trigger unintended immunological responses and therefore compromise its full utility as a medicine. To expand the potential of using plant chloroplasts to produce functional native human therapeutic proteins, we inserted an engineered human interleukin-2 (hIL-2)-coding gene, without any tags, into the chloroplast genome of tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum L.). Partially purified hIL-2 protein from the leaves of the transplastomic plants induced in vitro proliferation of IL-2-dependent murine T lymphocytes. Our study demonstrates that plant chloroplasts can serve as a bio-factory for production of an active native human interleukin in a self-contained and therefore environmentally safe manner.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Florida Atlantic University, 777 Glades Road, Boca Raton, FL, 33431, USA, xhzhang@fau.edu.
authors.forename: Xing-Hai
authors.initials: XH
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Patricia
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Keating
authors.forename: Xia-Wei
authors.initials: XW
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Yi-Hong
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: James
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Martin
authors.forename: James X
authors.initials: JX
authors.lastname: Hartmann
authors.forename: Aimin
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Liu
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D019149:Bioreactors; D002736:Chloroplasts / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D007376:Interleukin-2 / Q000096:biosynthesis* / Q000235:genetics*; D051379:Mice; D018515:Plant Leaves / Q000235:genetics; D030821:Plants, Genetically Modified / Q000235:genetics; D014026:Nicotiana / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: C508594:IL2 protein, human; D007376:Interleukin-2