The Pichia pastoris expression system is being used successfully for the production of various recombinant heterologous proteins. Recent developments with respect to the Pichia expression system have had an impact on not only the expression levels that can be achieved, but also the bioactivity of various heterologous proteins. We review here some of these recent developments, as well as strategies for reducing proteolytic degradation of the expressed recombinant protein at cultivation, cellular and protein levels. The problems associated with post-translational modifications performed on recombinant proteins by P. pastoris are discussed, including the effects on bioactivity and function of these proteins, and some engineering strategies for minimizing unwanted glycosylations. We pay particular attention to the importance of optimizing the physicochemical environment for efficient and maximal recombinant protein production in bioreactors and the role of process control in optimizing protein production is reviewed. Finally, future aspects of the use of the P. pastoris expression system are discussed with regard to the production of complex membrane proteins, such as G protein-coupled receptors, and the industrial and clinical importance of these proteins.

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Heterologous protein production using the Pichia pastoris expression system.

Most of the hosts used to produce the 151 recombinant pharmaceuticals so far approved for human use by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and/or by the European Medicines Agency (EMEA) are microbial cells, either bacteria or yeast. This fact indicates that despite the diverse bottlenecks and obstacles that microbial systems pose to the efficient production of functional mammalian proteins, namely lack or unconventional post-translational modifications, proteolytic instability, poor solubility and activation of cell stress responses, among others, they represent convenient and powerful tools for recombinant protein production. The entering into the market of a progressively increasing number of protein drugs produced in non-microbial systems has not impaired the development of products obtained in microbial cells, proving the robustness of the microbial set of cellular systems (so far Escherichia coli and Saccharomyces cerevisae) developed for protein drug production. We summarize here the nature, properties and applications of all those pharmaceuticals and the relevant features of the current and potential producing hosts, in a comparative way.

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Microbial factories for recombinant pharmaceuticals

After decades of slow progress, the pace of research on membrane protein structures is beginning to quicken thanks to various improvements in technology, including protein engineering and microfocus X-ray diffraction. Here we review these developments and, where possible, highlight generic new approaches to solving membrane protein structures based on recent technological advances. Rational approaches to overcoming the bottlenecks in the field are urgently required as membrane proteins, which typically comprise ~30% of the proteomes of organisms, are dramatically under-represented in the structural database of the Protein Data Bank.

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Overcoming barriers to membrane protein structure determination

Recombinant protein production is a multibillion-dollar market. The development of a new product begins with the choice of a production host. While one single perfect host for every protein does not exist, several expression systems ranging from bacterial hosts to mammalian cells have been established. Among them, yeast cell factories combine the advantages of being single cells, such as fast growth and easy genetic manipulation, as well as eukaryotic features including a secretory pathway leading to correct protein processing and post-translational modifications. In this respect, especially the engineering of yeast glycosylation to produce glycoproteins of human-like glycan structures is of great interest. Additionally, different attempts of cellular engineering as well as the design of different production processes that are leading to improved productivities are presented. With the advent of cheaper next-generation sequencing techniques, systems biotechnology approaches focusing on genome scale analyses will advance and accelerate yeast cell factories and thus recombinant protein production processes in the near future. In this review we summarize advantages and limitations of the main and most promising yeast hosts, including Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Pichia pastoris, and Hansenula polymorpha as those presently used in large scale production of heterologous proteins.

Recombinant Protein Production in Yeasts

The methylotrophic yeast Pichia pastoris has been widely reported as a suitable expression system for heterologous protein production. The use of different phenotypes under PAOX promoter, other alternative promoters, culture medium, and operational strategies with the objective to maximize either yield or productivity of the heterologous protein, but also to obtain a repetitive product batch to batch to get a robust process for the final industrial application have been reported. Medium composition, kinetics growth, fermentation operational strategies from fed-batch to continuous cultures using different phenotypes with the most common PAOX promoter and other novel promoters (GAP, FLD, ICL), the use of mixed substrates, on-line monitoring of the key fermentation parameters (methanol) and control algorithms applied to the bioprocess are reviewed and discussed in detail.

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Operational strategies, monitoring and control of heterologous protein production in the methylotrophic yeast Pichia pastoris under different promoters: A review

The expression of heterologous proteins may exert severe stress on the host cells at different levels. Depending on the specific features of the product, different steps may be rate-limiting. For the secretion of recombinant proteins from yeast cells, folding and disulfide bond formation were identified as rate-limiting in several cases and the induction of the chaperone BiP (binding protein) is described. During the development of Pichia pastoris strains secreting human trypsinogen, a severe limitation of the amount of secreted product was identified. Strains using either the AOX1 or the GAP promoter were compared at different gene copy numbers. With the constitutive GAP promoter, no effect on the expression level was observed, whereas with the inducible AOX1 promoter an increase of the copy number above two resulted in a decrease of expression. To identify whether part of the product remained in the cells, lysates were fractionated and significant amounts of the product were identified in the insoluble fraction containing the endoplasmic reticulum, while the soluble cytosolic fraction contained product only in clones using the GAP promoter. An increase of BiP was observed upon induction of expression, indicating that the intracellular product fraction exerts an unfolded protein response in the host cells. A strain using the GAP promoter was grown both on glucose and methanol and trypsinogen was identified in the insoluble fractions of both cultures, but only in the soluble fraction of the glucose grown cultures, indicating that the amounts and distribution of intracellularly retained product depends on the culture conditions, especially the carbon source.

Effects of gene dosage, promoters, and substrates on unfolded protein stress of recombinant Pichia pastoris.

Stress in recombinant protein producing yeasts.

Assessing viability and cell-associated product of recombinant protein producing Pichia pastoris with flow cytometry.

Bacterial expression and refolding of human trypsinogen

The present invention relates to a method for the manufacture andpurification of recombinant trypsinogen and trypsin in E. coli and yeast, using high yield expression vectors with and without secretion leader sequences. The invention further relates to an improved method and apparatus for carrying out protein refolding specifically useful for processing trypsinogen that has accumulated intracellularly in the form of inclusion bodies.

Hubertus Hohenblum

Papers

Effects of gene dosage, promoters, and substrates on unfolded protein stress of recombinant Pichia pastoris.

Stress in recombinant protein producing yeasts.

Assessing viability and cell-associated product of recombinant protein producing Pichia pastoris with flow cytometry.

Bacterial expression and refolding of human trypsinogen

Method for the manufacture of recombinant trypsin