The α-mating factor secretion signals and endogenous signal peptides for recombinant protein secretion in Komagataella phaffii

BackgroundThe budding yeast Komagataella phaffii (Pichia pastoris) is widely employed to secrete proteins of academic and industrial interest. For secretory proteins, signal peptides are the sorting signal to direct proteins from cytosol to extracellular matrix, and their secretion efficiency directly impacts the yields of the targeted proteins in fermentation broth. Although the alpha-mating factor (MF) secretion signal from S. cerevisiae, the most common and widely used signal sequence for protein secretion, works in most cases, limitation exists as some proteins cannot be secreted efficiently. As the optimal choice of secretion signals is often protein specific, more secretion signals need to be developed to augment protein expression levels in K. phaffii. ResultsIn this study, the secretion efficiency of 40 alpha-MF secretion signals from various yeast species and 32 endogenous signal peptides from K. phaffii were investigated using enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) as the model protein. All of the evaluated alpha-MF secretion signals successfully directed EGFP secretion except for the secretion signals of the yeast D. hansenii CBS767 and H. opuntiae. The secretion efficiency of alpha-MF secretion signal from Wickerhamomyces ciferrii was higher than that from S. cerevisiae. 24 out of 32 endogenous signal peptides successfully mediated EGFP secretion. The signal peptides of chr3_1145 and FragB_0048 had similar efficiency to S. cerevisiae alpha-MF secretion signal for EGFP secretion and expression. ConclusionsThe screened alpha-MF secretion signals and endogenous signal peptides in this study confer an abundance of signal peptide selection for efficient secretion and expression of heterologous proteins in K. phaffii.