Enhancing transient protein expression in HEK-293 cells by briefly exposing the culture to DMSO.
J Neurosci Methods 2020;
350:109058. [PMID:
33359979 DOI:
10.1016/j.jneumeth.2020.109058]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/29/2020] [Revised: 12/17/2020] [Accepted: 12/20/2020] [Indexed: 12/11/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND
Transient expression of proteins in mammalian cells is a key technique for many functional and structural studies of human and higher eukaryotic genes as well as for the production of recombinant protein therapeutics. Maximizing the expression efficiency to achieve a higher expression yield is desirable and may be even critical when, for instance, an expressed protein must be characterized at the single-cell level.
NEW METHODS
Our goal was to develop a simple method by which protein expression yield in human embryonic kidney (HEK)-293 cells could be enhanced with a brief treatment of dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) solution.
RESULTS
By expressing green fluorescent protein (GFP) as a reporter protein using the calcium phosphate transfection method and imaging a large population of cells, we found that a 5-min exposure of 10 % DMSO to HEK-293 cells, 4 h after transfection of the protein of interest, leads to ∼1.6-fold increase in the expression yield without causing any appreciable cytotoxicity. By expressing an α-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic acid (AMPA) and separately a kainate receptor in HEK-293 cells and measuring glutamate-induced whole-cell current response, we also found that such a brief DMSO treatment did not affect channel activity.
CONCLUSION
This method is simple, efficient and inexpensive to use for enhancing transient transfection yield in HEK-293 cells.
Collapse