Title:
Incorporation of a photoisomerizable non-natural amino acid into proteins for photo-control of protein functions

Speaker:
Takayoshi Watanabe (JAIST)

Abstract:
Incorporation of azobenzene, a photoisomerizable compound which undergoes cis-trans isomerization, into proteins makes it possible to control protein functions by irradiation. However, usual chemical modification of proteins with azobenzene compounds is non-site-specific and cannot be available for this purpose. To achieve site-specific incorporation of azobenzene into proteins, azobenzene-containing non-natural amino acid, AzoAla, was incorporated in response to amber codon. Here, we applied this strategy to cell-free synthesis of a photo-controllable single-chain antibody. Furthermore, to increase the yield of AzoAla-containing proteins, the incorporation of AzoAla was also investigated in E. coli using AzoAla-specific aminoacyl-tRNA synthetase mutant and an amber suppressor tRNA.