The production of improved tissue-type plasminogen activator in Escherichia coli

Tissue-type plasminogen activator (t-PA) is a valuable thrombolytic agent because of its high affinity to fibrin. When produced in mammalian cell lines, it is glycosylated, a modification that is believed to promote its rapid clearance from the circulation. Bacteria such as Escherichia coli have been tested as alternative expression systems but were not able to express the cDNA of t-PA effectively. The coding sequence for t-PA revealed a significant proportion of AGA and AGG codons, which are rarely used in the coding sequences of E. coli. The argU and argW gene products of E. coli proved to be minor tRNA(arg) species, respectively decoding the very rare triplets AGA/AGG and AGG for arginine. Analysis of genomic fragments from E. coli for both tRNA(arg) genes revealed the presence of defective, cryptic prophages integrated within the impaired tRNA genes. Cloning and supplementation of the limiting tRNA genes argU and argW on helper plasmids improved the translation of the rare AGA and AGG codons. This augmentation improved bacterial growth and enhanced t-PA production in the form of inactive inclusion bodies. This dependence on augmentation of tRNA(arg4) or tRNA(arg5) for improved cell growth and expression was also observed for other genes with a high content of these rare arginine codons. Construction and production of nonglycosylated t-PA in inclusion bodies in E. coli along with improvement of the subsequent renaturation and purification procedures resulted in material comparable to that derived from CHO cells. Deletion of domain-encoding segments yielded various "muteins" of t-PA (e.g., reteplase [rPA]) that could be produced in and activated from the purified inclusion bodies analogously. Furthermore, it was shown that rPA has an extended half-life in the circulation because of its lack of glycosylation and impaired receptor binding capability. rPA was successfully used in various clinical studies. It is a new-generation thrombolytic agent with a longer half-life and can thus be administered more conveniently as a double bolus.