Single-Step Protocol for Isolating the Recombinant Extracellular Domain of the Luteinizing Hormone Receptor from the Ovis aries Testis
, Itzel López-Rosas 2,3,*, Arnulfo Montero-Pardo 4, Elisa Azuara-Liceaga 5, Javier de Jesús Valencia-Méndez 6, Cynthia R. Trejo-Muñoz 7 and Carlos Kubli-Garfias 7,*
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This is an experimental animal study where authors obtained the extracellular domain of LHR in a protein expression heterologous system, in an effort to study the final LHR structure. They concluded that this approach demonstrates the feasibility to obtain large quantities of rLHR-Bed, which could lead to accomplish future studies on structural and functional biology of LHR receptor.
This is an interesting study; there are some suggestions to improve its quality. The materials and methods section should be more simple, indicating at first the exact study population, including eligibility criteria -if exist- and sample size calculation _yes, it is an animal study, but in this way, the robustness of the final results might be enlarged.
I would propose to separate results with discussion and final conclusions. Each of them should obtain a more structured format, for the reader to easier understand the follow of the paper. Limitations and future specific prospects should be added.
Author Response
"Please see the attachment"
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
1. Why were other E coli strains not explored to find an optimal host for soluble protein production? Strains like C41 and C43 are commonly used for solubilizing toxic or insoluble proteins.
2. Why were protease inhibitors like PMSF or a cocktail not used in the lysis buffer?
3. Why did the lysis carry out overnight? Please provide a lysis optimization to justify overnight incubation for cell lysis. Maybe overnight lysis is causing the protein to be aggregate.
4. How can we determine that the protein is renatured? Please provide a circular dichroism experiment with proper controls to show that the protein retains secondary structure after renaturation.
5. Why is DTT (a standard reagent in purification schemes) avoided? Please explain. Maybe this is the cause of aggregation.
6. Is any biochemical activity associated with the protein that can be used to test whether the renatured protein has attained a native-like tertiary structure after purification?
Author Response
"Please see the attachment"
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
