SBIR Phase I: Development of a Eukaryotic Membrane Protein Overexpression System

This Small Business Innovation Phase I research concentrates on creating overexpression technology for eukaryotic membrane proteins, a group of membrane proteins that remain intractable yet are of significant medical importance. A majority of membrane proteins are very difficult to obtain in significant quantity, even at milligram scale, since their natural biosynthesis levels often are very low and currently available protein expression methods are not effective for membrane proteins. With the completion of several genome sequencing projects, many large-scale efforts are under way to understand the protein products. The broader impacts of this research are significant in surface membrane proteins for structure-based drug design and protein engineering, protein therapeutics, and diagnostic devices. These efforts will provide new understanding of membrane proteins as well as lead to new generations of efficacious medicines for virtually all therapeutic areas including infectious diseases, cancer, genetic diseases due to genetic defect in membrane proteins, central nervous system diseases, cardiovascular system diseases, digestive system diseases and many others.