Expression of human IL-31 in E.coli and identification of its activity

Objective To construct a prokaryotic expression vector containing the coding region of human IL-31 gene,and to study the effect of hIL-31 on the production of MIP-3β in HaCaT cells.Methods Human IL-31 cDNA was digested by BamHI and HindIII from pET28a(+)-hIL-31 and cloned into pET32a(+) vector and sequenced.The recombinant protein was achieved in E.coli through IPTG induction.The effect of the recombinant protein on the production of MIP-3β was detected by RT-PCR.Results Obtained encoding sequence of hIL-31 was identical with that included in Genbank,and the prokaryotic expression vector pET32a(+)-hIL31 was construct correctly.Human IL-31 could be expressed in E.coli after IPTG induction.The recombinant protein could upregulate the expression of MIP-3β in HaCaT cells.Conclusions Human IL-31 is successfully expressed in E.coli.Purified hIL-31 has biological activity of upregulating the expression of MIP-3 HaCaT cells.This is helpful to study its function and prepare hIL-31 monoclonal antibody.