Expression and purification of a two-component flaviviral proteinase resistant to autocleavage at the NS2B-NS3 junction region.

Regulated proteolysis of the polyprotein precursor of West Nile virus (WNV) by the essential NS2B-NS3(pro)tease, a promising drug target for WNV inhibitors, is required for the propagation of infectious virions. Structural and drug design studies, however, require pilot-scale quantities of a pure and catalytically active WNV protease that is resistant to self-proteolysis. Autolytic cleavage at the NS2B-NS3 boundary leads to individual, non-covalently associated, NS2B and NS3 domains, together with residual amounts of the intact NS2B-NS3, in the NS2B-NS3pro samples. We modified the cleavage site sequence of the NS2B-NS3 junction region and then developed expression and purification procedures to prepare a covalently linked, single-chain, NS2B-NS3pro K48A mutant construct. This construct exhibits high stability and functional activity and is thus well suited for the follow-up purification and structural and drug design studies.