AAV with ALB(1.9) promoter driven TdTomato

This AAV expresses TdTomato driven by a liver ALB(1.9) promoter.

The ALB(1.9) is a synthetic promoter of ~1.9 Kb. It is based on the human Albumin promoter as well as several other regulatory elements. This synthetic promoter gives an extremely high level of long-term, liver-specific transgene expression that is 100-100 fold greater than that of the CMV promoter. For short-term (1-2 weeks post-injection into mouse liver), ALB(1.9) gives comparable expression relative to that of the CMV promoter. However, the expression level of the CMV promoter decreases 100-1000 fold from its peak level within 10-20 weeks of DNA administration whereas the ALB(1.9) promoter sustains its initial high level of expression for over 1 year. Compared to the regular ALB promoter, which is also commonly used for liver-specific transgene expression, the expression level from ALB(1.9) is about 10-100 fold greater.

dTomato belongs to a family of fluorescent proteins called mFruit. Two dTomato units were joined head-to-tail through a linker, yielding a tandem dimer fluorescent protein, tdTomato. The tdTomato derivative is the brightest fluorescent protein yet reported, featuring an orange-red emission maximum at 581nm and is one of the most photo-stable fluorescent proteins. Other fluorescent proteins with similar emission spectra include DsRed, DsRed2, TurboRFP, TagRFP, and TagRFP-T.