Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Elizabeth Lamb recently spoke with Dr. Alexei Yeliseev, a Staff Scientist at the National Institute of Health, about his upcoming presentation “Improving Yield and Stability of Cannabinoid Receptor”, to be delivered in the Difficult to Express Proteins meeting at the 2018 PEGS event. PEGS is scheduled for April 30 - May 4, 2018 in Boston, with the difficult proteins meeting set for April 30-May 1.
Thank you for your willingness to chat with me, Dr. Yeliseev. I wanted to ask you a couple question about the current state of protein expression and your thoughts of emerging new technologies and techniques that you feel hold a great deal of promise to solve the problems of difficult to express proteins. My first question is what is the most challenging bottleneck in the expression of difficult proteins?
In my opinion, it is the poor predictability of the success of expression of a target protein. For example, for membrane proteins, one needs to experimentally test several expression methods, hosts, expression vectors, induction conditions, etc., and all these do not guarantee success. As a result, an expression of the “difficult” protein could become a challenging research project with an uncertain outcome.
What do you see as the most promising new technique or technology coming along in the near future in the field?
Of course, the choice of a particular expression strategy depends on the quantity/ quality requirements for the target protein. I would single out a cell-free approach for expression. This is a very promising platform for preparation of challenging proteins. Assuming that we know what conditions and co-factors are needed for expression of a particular class of proteins, a cell-free system offers a significant flexibility that allows us to supplement the system with components needed for successful expression of the target. In that respect it offers an advantage over cell-based approaches.
Thank you for your time, Dr. Yeliseev! I appreciate your thoughts and insights!
Alexei Yeliseev, PhD, Staff Scientist, Group Leader, LMBB, NIH, NIAAA
Alexei Yeliseev is a Staff Scientist at the National Institute on Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse, National Institute of Health. He heads the protein biochemistry group focusing on developing technologies for expression, purification, and functional and structural characterization of G protein-coupled receptors. In addition to his research work he serves as a member of editorial board of Protein Expression and Purification and Journal of Receptor, Ligand and Channel Research.