The potential role of self-cleaving purification tags in commercial-scale processes

Purification tags are robust tools that can be used to purify a wide selection of target proteins, which makes them attractive candidates for implementation into platform processes. However, tag removal remains an expensive and significant issue that must be resolved before these tags can become widely used. One alternative is self-cleaving purification tags, which can provide the purity and versatility of conventional tags but eliminate the need for proteolytic tag removal. Many of these self-cleaving tags are based on inteins, but other emerging technologies, such as the FrpC and SrtAc proteins, have also been reported. In this review, we cover affinity and non-chromatographic self-cleaving purification tags and their potential industrial applications.