Notice of Retraction: Expression of Human Interleukin-6 in Tobacco by Chloroplast Engineering

Abstract

Chloroplast engineering has been developed as an important platform for biopharmaceutical proteins production. In this study, we aimed to introduce human interleukin-6 (IL-6) encoding sequence into tobacco chloroplast genome by chloroplast transformation and express the protein in plant chloroplasts. Expression vector pTRVIL6, which carries homologous fragment rp12-trnH-psbA-trnK of N. tabacum chloroplast genome, was constructed and used for biolistic bombardment of tobacco leaves. Two transplastomic lines were obtained. The results of PCR and southern blot analysis suggest that IL-6 gene has been inserted into the right site of tobacco chloroplast genome by homologous recombination and that the transformed tissuess have finished homoplasmy. RT-PCR analysis confirms that IL-6 gene is transcribed successfully in both lines. To our knowledge, this is the first report of IL-6 expression in plant. Production of IL-6 by plant would have high potential application.