Effects of the Magnetic Orientation of M13 Bacteriophage on Phage Display Selection.

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Although phage display selection using a library of M13 bacteriophage has become a powerful tool for finding peptides binding to target materials, a remaining concern of this method is the interference by the M13 main body, which is a huge filament >103 times larger than the displayed peptide, and therefore would nonspecifically adhere to the target or sterically inhibit the binding of the displayed peptide. Meanwhile, filamentous phages are known to be orientable by a magnetic field. If M13 filaments are magnetically oriented during the selection, their angular arrangement toward the target surface would be changed, being expected to control the interference by the M13 main body. Here we report that the magnetic orientation of M13 filaments vertical to the target surface significantly affects the selection. When the target surface was affinitive to the M13 main body, this orientation notably suppressed the nonspecific adhesion. Furthermore, when the target surface was less affinitive to the M13 main body and intrinsically free from the nonspecific adhesion, this orientation drastically changed the population of M13 clones obtained through selection. Our method of using no chemicals but only a physical stimulus, is simple, clean, and expected to expand the scope of phage display selection.