Despite potent antiviral and antiproliferative activities, interferons have not been optimized as therapeutic agents. Chang et al. apply the power of DNA family shuffling to selectively evolve interferon genes for specific applications (p. 793). Starting from over 20 human interferon genes, they generated variants with strongly increased activity on murine cells, some of which were even more potent than native murine interferon.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Frederickson, R. Evolving cytokines. Nat Biotechnol 17, 739 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1038/11650
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/11650