Revolutionizing Peptide Production: Introducing Numacut TEV Protease
Bach-Ngan Wetzel
Postdoctoral Researcher, Numaferm GmbH
The Boulder Peptide Symposium 2024 will feature a significant breakthrough in biotechnology: the Numacut TEV Protease. This innovative enzyme, derived from the tobacco etch virus (TEV) is poised to transform the production of peptides and proteins. Conventional TEV proteases are crucial for removing solubility or affinity tags from fusion proteins, yet they are limited by their specificity at the P1’ position, often hampering cleavage activity or resulting in an extra amino acid on the N-terminus of target molecules. Extra residues at the N-terminus pose a challenge, especially for small peptides (2-50 amino acids), where structural integrity and function are paramount.
Numacut, created through advanced computational methods, addresses these issues with its exceptional substrate specificity. It can efficiently cleave a wide range of amino acids at the P1’ position, overcoming the limitations of conventional TEV protease. This capability was demonstrated in studies involving multiple Switchtag-Teriparatide fusions, each with a different amino acid at P1’, showcasing Numacut's adaptability to previously challenging residues.
The enzyme's introduction marks a milestone in peptide synthesis, offering a more versatile approach to produce peptides and proteins with native N-termini. Numacut is already an essential component of Numaferm's Numaswitch technology, highlighting its potential as a universal TEV protease platform. The symposium will delve into Numacut's development, its unique properties, and its vast applications, providing attendees with a comprehensive understanding of its role in advancing biotechnological research and production.
Bach-Ngan Wetzel a postdoctoral researcher leading Numaferm’s products department at Numaferm GmbH started her journey in the field of biotechnology at the University of Applied Sciences in Aachen. She continued to expand her knowledge at the University of Münster, delving deeper into the complexities of biotechnology. In 2023, she completed her external PhD in the Institute of Biochemistry of the University of Düsseldorf in collaboration with the biotechnology company Numaferm. In her research, she focused on optimizing peptide and protein production using Numaferm's recombinant expression platform Numaswitch, aiming to improve and broaden the company's capabilities for industrial-scale production while maintaining uncompromised product quality. In collaboration with various partners, her research included improving the specificity of the TEV protease, a crucial enzyme for the Numaswitch technology and one of the most widely applied enzymes in biotechnology.