Recent Advances on the Baculovirus-mediated Expression of Foreign Gene in Mammalian Cells

Abstract:

Baculovirus is an insect virus that naturally infects and replicates in insect cells. It has been employed as bioinsecticide and also for production of recombinant proteins and vaccines. It was found by several studies that baculoviruses harboring mammalian expression cassettes could efficiently express reporter genes in mammalian cells. Benefit from the low cytotoxicity and non-replication nature in mammalian cells, the transduced cells could stably passage and effectively express foreign genes. Another benefit of this expression system is the advanced post-translational modification of expressed proteins. All the advantages mentioned above have captured growing attention as a novel vector for protein expression and in vivo gene therapy. In this article, the progress of baculovirus as a expression vector in mammalian cells was reviewed.

Key words:Baculovirus, Foreign gene, Mammalian cells