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Single–Cell Light Scatter as a Probe of Refractile Body Formation in Recombinant Escherichia Coli

Abstract

Accumulation of foreign proteins as inclusion bodies in Escherichia coli was investigated using single–cell light scatter measurements from flow cytometry. Significant increases in forward–angle light scatter and right–angle light scatter were observed for E. coli strains overproducing two types of interferon and two types of veterinary growth hormone. The original host morphology before the induction of foreign gene expression was found to have a significant effect on the subsequent enhancement of light scatter by inclusion body formation. The light scatter distributions obtained by flow cytometry differed significantly from volume distributions obtained using Coulter sizing. Thus flow cytometry may provide information on cloned gene product accumulation at the single–cell level that is not available from other methods.

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Wittrup, K., Mann, M., Fenton, D. et al. Single–Cell Light Scatter as a Probe of Refractile Body Formation in Recombinant Escherichia Coli. Nat Biotechnol 6, 423–426 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt0488-423

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