Potato tubers as a biofactory for recombinant antibodies

Potato tubers have been successfully used for high-level production of a recombinant single-chain Fv (ScFv) antibody. Ubiquitous high-level expression was achieved under control of the CaMV 35S promoter through retention of the scFv protein in the endoplasmic reticulum. Recombinant antibodies accumulated up to 2% of total soluble tuber protein. After 1.5 years of tuber storage at 4 degrees C still half of the amount of scFv present in freshly harvested tubers was detectable. Its specific activity did not decrease during tuber storage. Recombinant protein could be efficiently purified from crude extracts by affinity chromatography.