Baculovirus expression: tackling the complexity challenge

Most essential functions in eukaryotic cells are catalyzed by complex molecular machines built of many subunits. To fully understand their biological function in health and disease, it is imperative to study these machines in their entirety. The provision of many essential multiprotein complexes of higher eukaryotes including humans, can be a considerable challenge, as low abundance and heterogeneity often rule out their extraction from native source material. The baculovirus expression vector system (BEVS), specifically tailored for multiprotein complex production, has proven itself to be uniquely suited for overcoming this impeding bottleneck. Here we highlight recent major achievements in multiprotein complex structure research that were catalyzed by this versatile recombinant complex expression tool.