Comparison of Expression Vectors for Transient Expression of Recombinant Proteins in Plants

Abstract

Production of recombinant proteins in plants is of increasing importance for practical applications. However, the production of stable transformed transgenic plants is a lengthy procedure. Transient expression, on the other hand, can deliver recombinant proteins within a week, and many viral vectors have been constructed for that purpose. Each of them is reported to be highly efficient, robust and cost-effective. Here, a variety of expression vectors which were designed for transient and stable plant transformation, including pPZP3425, pPZP5025, pPZPTRBO, pJLTRBO, pEAQ-HT and pBY030-2R, was compared for the expression of green fluorescent protein and β-glucuronidase in Nicotiana benthamiana by Agrobacterium-mediated transient expression. Our results show that pPZPTRBO, pJLTRBO and pEAQ-HT had comparable expression levels without co-infiltration of a RNA-silencing inhibitor. The other vectors, including the non-viral vectors pPZP5025 and pPZP3425, needed co-infiltration of the RNA-silencing inhibitor P19 to give good expression levels. © 2013 The Author(s).