Construction Of Retro-vector Containing Human Proenkephalin Gene And Its' Expression

The treatment of chronic stubborn pain and cancerous pain is a difficult and important problem which needs to be solved. Chronic pain, especially caused by the cancer, cannot be efficiently relieved by a number of conventional analgesics methods. With the development of molecular biology and techniques, gene therapy is becoming the new approach that could solve this problem. Enkephalin(Enk), as a type of endogenous opioid peptides, has been tested to have capably analgesics effect by numerous investigations using animal model. So the possibility of using Enk gene therapy as a potential novel treatment for chronic pain is taken into consideration. pLNCX2 plasmid contains elements derived from Moloney murine leukemia virus (MMLV) and Moloney murine sarcoma virus (MMSV), and is designed for retroviral gene delivery and expression. The 5' viral LTR in this vector contains viral promoter/enhancer sequences that control expression of the neomycin resistance (Neo^r) gene for antibiotic selection in eukaryotic cells. A gene of interest can be cloned into the multiple cloning sites immediately downstream of the human cytomegalovirus (CMV) mediated by early promoter (P_CMV). pLNCX2 vector also includes the Col El origin of replication and E. coli Amp^r gene for propagation and antibiotic selection in bacteria. Upon transfection into...