High level expression of the synthetic human lysozyme gene in Aspergillus oryzae

Aspergillus oryzae was transformed with a synthetic gene consisting of a chicken lysozyme signal sequence and a mature human lysozyme (HLY) sequence. The transformants secreted active HLY (about 1.2 mg/l) when the HLY gene was expressed under the control of the Taka-amylase A gene (amyB) promoter. Western blot analysis suggested that the secreted protein was immunoreactive with anti-human lysozyme antibody and the signal peptide was correctly cleavaged off in the A. oryzae transformants. The transcriptional level of the HLY gene was investigated by Northern blot analysis using a probe that was equivalently specific to both the HLY gene and the amyB gene. The HLY gene was expressed at a higher level compared with the amyB gene because of its multi-copy integration. The efficient transcription of the HLY gene suggested that A. oryzae is a promising host for production of heterologous proteins from higher eukaryotes.