Comparison of microbial and transient expression (tobacco plants and plant‐cell packs) for the production and purification of the anticancer mistletoe lectin viscumin

Cancer is the leading cause of death in industrialized countries. Cancer therapy often involves monoclonal antibodies or small‐molecule drugs, but carbohydrate‐binding lectins such as mistletoe (Viscum album) viscumin offer a potential alternative treatment strategy. Viscumin is toxic in mammalian cells, ruling them out as an efficient production system, and it forms inclusion bodies in Escherichia coli such that purification requires complex and lengthy refolding steps. We therefore investigated the transient expression of viscumin in intact Nicotiana benthamiana plants and Nicotiana tabacum Bright Yellow 2 plant‐cell packs (PCPs), comparing a full‐length viscumin gene construct to separate constructs for the A and B chains. As determined by capillary electrophoresis the maximum yield of purified heterodimeric viscumin in N. benthamiana was ~7 mg/kg fresh biomass with the full‐length construct. The yield was about 50% higher in PCPs but reduced 10‐fold when coexpressing A and B chains as individual polypeptides. Using a single‐step lactosyl‐Sepharose affinity resin, we purified viscumin to ~54%. The absence of refolding steps resulted in estimated cost savings of more than 80% when transient expression in tobacco was compared with E. coli. Furthermore, the plant‐derived product was ~3‐fold more toxic than the bacterially produced counterpart. We conclude that plants offer a suitable alternative for the production of complex biopharmaceutical proteins that are toxic to mammalian cells and that form inclusion bodies in bacteria.