Method for making hormone heterodimers

Abstract

The present invention relates to a method for preparing heterodimeric analogs of cysteine knot proteins. More specifically, the invention relates to a method for forming a subunit combination of a cysteine knot protein having an α-subunit and a β-subunit to prepare a heterodimeric protein analog which comprises the steps of (a) attaching a dimerization domain to the amino termini of both an α-subunit and β-subunit of a cysteine knot protein; and (b) dimerizing the α-subunit and β-subunit to form a heterodimeric protein analog. In another embodiment, the invention relates to a method for forming a subunit combination of a cysteine knot protein having an α-subunit and a β-subunit to prepare a heterodimeric protein analog which comprises the steps of (a) attaching a dimerization domain to the amino terminus of an α-subunit and the carboxy terminus of a β-subunit of a cysteine knot protein; and (b) dimerizing the α-subunit and β-subunit to form a heterodimeric protein analog.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.