China Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine ›› 2021, Vol. 48 ›› Issue (1): 72-82.doi: 10.16431/j.cnki.1671-7236.2021.01.008

• Biotechnology • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Cloning and Bioinformatics Analysis of the Siberian Tiger γ-interferon Gene and Its Expression in Pichia pastoris

ZHAI Junqiong1, WU Yajiang1, DAI Junwei1, CHEN Anni2, ZHOU Niu1, WANG Chen1, DU Xueqing1, LUO Manlin2, CHEN Wu1   

  1. 1. Guangzhou Wildlife Research Center of Guangzhou Zoo, Guangzhou 510070, China;
    2. Collgeg of Veterinary Medicine, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
  • Received:2020-05-18 Online:2021-01-20 Published:2021-01-15

Abstract: The purpose of this experiment was to clone the Siberian tiger γ-interferon (IFN-γ) gene,studied its molecular characteristics and predicted the biological function of the protein,making preliminary preparations for the subsequent study of the antiviral activity of interferon.The Siberian tiger IFN-γ gene was amplified from ConA-induced Siberian tiger blood lymphocytes by RT-PCR and sequenced to obtain the sequence.Bioinformatics was used for sequence analysis.The results showed that IFN-γ gene coding region consisted of 504 nucleotides,encoding a total of 167 amino acids.The relative molecular weight of the Siberian tiger IFN-γ amino acid was 19.59 ku,the isoelectric point was 9.03.The encoded protein was a basic hydrophilic protein,of which the first 23 amino acids might be signal peptides.The conserved domain of the IFN-γ encoded protein was the IFN-γ superfamily,and there was a transmembrane structure,in which amino acids 1-6 were intracellular regions and amino acids 7-28 were transmembrane regions,amino acids 29-167 were extracellular regions.The secondary structure of IFN-γ encoded protein was mainly α-helix (58.08%) and random coil (33.53%).There were 5 potential B cell epitopes and 3 potential N-glycosylation sites.Sequence analysis showed that the Siberian tiger IFN-γ had 80.4%-99.8% nucleotide similarity to the Siberian tiger,African lion,leopard,puma,cheetah,domestic cat,Canadian lynx and wild boar published on GenBank,and the amino acid similarity was 70.5%-100%,nucleotide genetic evolution analysis showed that Siberian tiger IFN-γ had the closest relationship with African lions and leopards,followed by puma,cheetah,domestic cat and lynx,and wild boars were farthest.By synthesizing the modified Siberian tiger IFN-γ gene,a recombinant plasmid pPIC9K-IFN-γ capable of secreting and expressing IFN-γ protein was constructed,which was introduced into a highly efficient expression system-Pichia pastoris to induce expression,and analyzed by SDS-PAGE,the molecular weight of the expressed protein was about 17.8 ku,which was consistent with the expected size,indicating that the Siberian tiger IFN-γ was successfully expressed.

Key words: Siberian tiger; γ-interferon (IFN-γ); gene cloning; bioinformatics; Pichia pastoris

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