Lactoferrin Gene Expression and Antioxidant Activity in Tomato

Area of Science:

• Biotechnology
• Plant molecular biology
• Protein expression

Background:

• Plant bioreactors offer cost-effective, scalable, and safe production of bioactive proteins.
• Microbial production of lactoferrin (LF) faces limitations, necessitating alternative expression systems.
• Tomato is a promising platform for heterologous protein expression.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the feasibility of producing functional human lactoferrin (hLF) in transgenic tomato plants.
• To evaluate the biological activity, specifically antioxidant properties, of tomato-derived hLF.
• To validate the efficacy of plant-expressed hLF using animal cell models.

Main Methods:

• Codon-optimized human lactoferrin (hLF) gene was cloned into a plant expression vector.
• Transgenic tomato lines were generated using Agrobacterium-mediated transformation.
• hLF expression was confirmed via molecular analyses; biological activity assessed using in vitro cell assays.

Main Results:

• Transgenic tomato plants successfully expressed hLF, with highest levels in fruits.
• Increased expression of antioxidant enzyme genes was observed in most transgenic lines.
• Tomato-derived hLF promoted proliferation and reduced reactive oxygen species (ROS) in treated human lung fibroblasts.

Conclusions:

• Tomato is a viable system for producing biologically active human lactoferrin.
• Tomato-expressed hLF exhibits antioxidant activity, potentially through direct ROS scavenging.
• This study validates the use of plant-based expression for therapeutic protein production.