Rationally designed and chemically synthesized promoter for genetic vaccine and gene therapy
AssigneeBoard of Regents, The University of Texas System
InventorsStephen Johnston, Bao-Xi Qu
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
The present invention relates to chemically synthesized promoters that circumvent the disadvantages of the universal CMV promoter/enhancer elements. The promoter may be used in a variety of applications, particularly in genetic immunization. The chemically synthesized promoter overcomes the common problems of the CMV promoter element such as: low transgene expression levels, transient expression, and the large amount of plasmid DNA needed for intramuscular injection in subjects.
Claims35
A nucleic acid segment comprising a synthetic promoter/enhancer, or the complement of such a promoter/enhancer wherein the promoter/enhancer is optimized for use in genetic immunization and/or gene therapy.
A nucleic acid segment comprising a promoter sequence comprising regions encoding promoter elements including a TATA box, a TFIIB binding element, an initiator, a downstream promoter element, and an upstream binding element.
A method of expressing a polypeptide in a subject comprising:
- (a) obtaining a first nucleic acid segment comprising a region encoding a synthetic promoter/enhancer wherein the promoter/enhancer is optimized for use in genetic immunization and/or gene expression;
- (b) obtaining a second nucleic acid segment comprising a region encoding the polypeptide;
- (c) operatively linking the first nucleic acid to the second nucleic acid to form a construct comprising at least the region encoding the promoter and the region encoding the polypeptide;
- and
- (d) administering the construct to the subject.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.