TECHNICAL NOTE
Monitoring the impact of storage-dependent denaturation
on protein quality using Tycho NT.6
Mariam Mohamadi, Nuška Tschammer and Dennis Breitsprecher
NanoTemper Technologies GmbH, Floessergasse 4, 81369 Munich
Introduction
Expression and purification are critical steps in protein discovery and
characterization workflows. Equally important in the workflow is the optimization
of storage conditions that will ensure protein stability. Unfortunately, researchers
spend little effort evaluating the effects of storage on the quality of samples
prepared in-house or of those obtained through commercial vendors, which can
be attributed in part to the lack of quick and simple quality check methods.
The Tycho™ NT.6 system enables quick
assessment of the effect of storage
conditions on protein integrity.
Tycho NT.6 records precise thermal unfolding profiles of proteins in as little as
three minutes, so researchers can quickly detect the presence of unfolded protein
in their samples before it is used in an assay and negatively impacts the outcome.
In this technical note, we show how such a storage-dependent increase in the
amount of unfolded protein directly affects the quality of biophysical assays,
highlighting the importance of rigorous quality checks.