TwinCatcher

Background

Most proteins in the cell form homodimers or homotetramers. No experimental systems exist for rapid detection and modulation of protein homodimerization.

Description of invention

The present invention is two new homodimerization assays constructed on the basis of bacterial transcription factors LexA and ToxR and the plasmids used for such assays. The assays of the present invention are user-friendly as well as very cost- and time-efficient. Furthermore, the assays have a wide range of applications from engineering of oligomeric proteins to discovery of inhibitors of protein-protein interactions and basic study of homodimerizing interactions. The system is modular and can be adapted to a wide variety of reporter systems enabling diverse screening methods, such as fluorescence, blue-white screening, selection with antibiotics, etc. We are currently at TRL 4 of development.

Main advantages

TwinCatcher is the only modular system that enables the detection of homophilic protein-protein interactions in both the cytoplasm and periplasm of E. coli.