Bacillus brevis, a Host Bacterium for Efficient Extracellular Production of Useful Proteins

The work described in this review was begun in 1971, when attempts were made to isolate micro-organisms that produce proteins extracellularly in large amounts. Fortunately, in vitro recombinant DNA technology emerged a few years after we had started this work. It was thus quite natural that we tried to utilize this splendid technology to obtain protein-hyperproducers to yield various important proteins. Although it took many years to explore the new technology, we succeeded in constructing an excellent host-vector system for producing foreign proteins, using protein-hyperproducing Bacillus brevis as the host