초록
xylA 프로모터는 대장균의 xylose 대사에 관여하는 xylose 오페론 상의 중요한 프로모터이다. 이 프로모터는 xylose에 의해 강하게 조절을 받는다고 알려져 있다. 이러한 특징은 새로운 발현 백터를 구축하는데 충분한 조건을 갖추고 있다고 생각된다. 본 연구에서는 이러한 xylose에 의해 유도 되는 발현벡터를 구축하기 위하여 600 bp의 xylA 프로모터를 증폭하여 pUC18의 AatII와 HindIII 사이에 삽입하여 pXA600을 구축하였다. 또한 조절단백질인 XylR의 영향을 조사하기 위하여 xylR 유전자를 삽입하여 pXAR600을 구축하였다. 발현의 강도를 측정하기 위하여 3,048 bp의 lacZ유전자를 xylA 프로모터의 하류에 연결하여 pXA600-lacZ와 pXAR600-lacZ를 구축하고 대장균 JM109에 형질전환시켰다. 구축된 pXA600-lacZ와 pXAR600-lacZ는 LB 배지에서 배양하였을 때 xylose 유도하에서 각각 1,641 unit와 2,304 unit의 $\beta$-galactosidase 활성을 보였으며, DM 배지상에서 배양했을 때 xylose 유도 시 각각 6,282 unit와 9,320 unit의 $\beta$-galactosidase 활성을 보였다. 또한 왜래 유전자의 발현 가능성을 확인하기 위하여 S. thermocyaneoviolaceus의 내열성 xylanase를 코딩하는 xynA 유전자를 실제로 구축된 pXA600과 pXAR600에서 발현을 확인하여 pXA600 및 pXAR600이 새로운 xylose 유도성 발현벡터로서의 사용 가능성을 확인하였다.
xylA promoter is a major promoter in xylose operon of Escherichia coli. xylA promoter is sufficient as the promoter for the construction of new expression vector because this promoter was tightly controlled and induced by the addition of xylose. For the construction of xylose-inducible expression vector, 600 bp of xylA promoter was ligated between AatII and HindIII of pUC18, named pXA600. In order to investigate the effect of XylR protein encoded by xylR gene on the xylA promoter, 1,988 bp of xylR gene including its promoter was ligated into downstream of multiple cloning site to the opposite direction of xylA promoter in pXA600, named pXAR600. For the measurement of expression level, 3,048 bp of lacZ structural gene was fused into xylA promoter in both plasmids pXA600 and pXAR600 as a reporter gene, named pXA600-lacZ and pXAR600-lacZ, respectively. The $\beta$-galactosidase activity of pXA600-lacZ and pXAR600-lacZ in E. coli JM109 was determined to be 1,641 and 2,304 unit by the induction with xylose in LB medium, respectively. The $\beta$-galactosidase activity of pXAR600-lacZ/JM109 was about 1.4 times higher by the induction with xylose than that of pXA600-lacZ/JM109. The $\beta$-galactosidase activity of pXA600-lacZ and pXAR600-lacZ in E.coli JM109 showed 6,282 and 9,320 unit by the induction with xylose in DM minimal medium, respectively. A regulator, xylR protein works as an activator for the gene expression by the addition of xylose in the xylose-inducible vectors because the level of gene expression in pXA600 is increased by the insertion of xylR gene into the same vector. The xynA gene of Streptomyces thermocyaneoviolaceus cloned in pXA600 and pXAR600 was successfully expressed in E. coli BLR(DE3). As a result, plasmids pXA600 and pXAR600 using xylA promoter are sufficient as new expression system to produce a foreign protein in E. coli.