Cloning and overexpression of human immunodeficiency virus-1 gag and env derived epitopes in E. coli

Abstract

In order to develop inexpensive and sensitive serodiagnostics, parts of the gag, env genes or gag-env fusion genes of HIV-1 were cloned and expressed in E. coli, using expression vectors contaning trp or tac promoter. Immunoreacitivities of recombinant proteins were determined using HIV-1 specific antibodies in western blot analysis. Experimental results showed the feasibility of mass production of HIV-1 gag, and env derived proteins which can be used for HIV-1 serodignostics in screening a large number of blood donors to prevent HIV-1 infection.