Cloning, high-level expression, purification and characterization of a staphylokinase variant, SakøC, from Staphylococcus aureus QT08 in Escherichia coli BL21

Abstract

The staphylokinase (Sak) is emerging as an important thrombolytic agent for the treatment of patients suffering from cardiovascular disease. Hence in this study, we reported the cloning, high-level expression, purification and characterization of the Sak variant SakøC from Staphylococcus aureus QT08 in Escherichia coli Bl21. The sak gene of 489 bp encoding a protein (163 amino acids) with a predicted molecular mass of 18.5 kDa and pI 7.28 showed 99.8 to 99.6% identity with corresponding sequences from S. aureus strains deposited in GenBank (AF332619, X00127, EF122253 and M57455). The DNA sequence (411 bp) encoding the mature Sak (15.5 kDa) truncated 27 N-terminal amino acids was expressed in E. coli BL21/pESak under the control of the strong promoter tac in the presence of isopropyl-β-D-1-thiogalactopynoside (IPTG) as inducer. The expression level of rSak was estimated at about 42% of the total cellular proteins by densitometry scanning, which is the highest expression level of rSak expressed in any E. coli system. The recombinant staphylokinase was purified by Ni²⁺- ProBond^TM column to a single homogeneous 16-kDa band on sodium dodecyl sulphate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) with a specific activity of 15175 U/mg protein, a recovery yield of 58% and a purification factor of 2.56. The optimal pH and temperature for the rSak activity was 9 and 37°C, respectively. rSak was stable over a temperature range of 25 to 50°C and at pH range of 7 to 9. Metal ions and detergents also showed an inhibitory effect on rSak, especially Zn²⁺ and Cu²⁺ which completely inhibited the enzymatic activity.

Key words: Staphylococcus aureus QT08, staphylokinase, cloning, high-level expression, purification, characterization.