Flexible approaches are required for successful production of recombinant proteins in plants

Production of recombinant proteins has increased significantly due to the ever-increasing demand in research laboratories, medical fields, and agriculture. Despite a variety of recombinant protein expression systems and gene engineering procedures exist owever, there is a limitation in achieving sufficient quantities of active, properly folded recombinant proteins. The selection of an appropriate expression system for the production of recombinant proteins should generally be chosen based on the biochemical and biological properties of the desired proteins to be produced. Plant expression platforms offer commercially inexpensive, safe, and fast scale-up properties for the production of recombinant proteins compared to traditional mammalian cell expression systems. However, the absence of some mammalian posttranslational modifications (PTMs) and aberrant N-glycosylation limit the use of these production systems. Therefore, molecular engineering of plant secretory pathways has provided an opportunity to develop next-generation pharmaceuticals with targeted biological functions. In this mini-review, we discuss the approaches that are needed for the production of functional recombinant proteins such as vaccines, antibodies, enzymes for medical, agricultural, and industrial applications.

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