Animal-free Expression

Plant expression systems are used when animal-free recombinant protein products are required. Compared to traditional microbial or animal cell systems, the animal-free plant expression systems greatly reduce the risk of contamination with animal-origin pathogens. Furthermore, plant production possesses superior advantages in storage, distribution and scale-up.

Many plant species have been developed as protein expression systems, such as rice, tobacco, and Arabidopsis thaliana. To obtain transgenic plants for the stable expression of proteins, plant virus and bacterium are utilized to deliver the desired gene into plant hosts. The most commonly used delivery systems include tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) and Agrobacterium.