Xenopus oocytes as a heterologous expression system for plant proteins.

The Xenopus oocyte is a robust and convenient system for the transient expression of many different animal proteins and it has recently been demonstrated that oocytes can also translate, process, and target plant proteins. This expression system can also be used to clone genes, characterize function, and study posttranslational processing of proteins. Here we describe the methodology for the expression of plant proteins, in particular membrane proteins, in Xenopus oocytes.