The invention provides composition and methods for producing proteins of
interest which comprise at least one disulfide bond, include proteins
which in their mature form do not contain disulfide bonds, but whose
precursor molecule contained at least one disulfide bond. The methods
employ a host cell modified to more efficiently produce properly folded
disulfide bond containing proteins. The host cells generally contain a
mutation in one or more reductase genes, and can be further genetically
modified to increase their growth rate, and are further optionally
modified to increase the expression of a catalyst of disulfide bond
formation. Host cells, methods for using such to produce proteins of
interest, proteins of interest produced by these methods are within the
scope of the invention.
