Yeast - a panacea for the structure-function analysis of membrane proteins?

In recent years, the scientific community has begun to realise that the str ucture-function analysis of membrane proteins has lagged considerably behin d that of their soluble counterparts. A boom in the field of membrane prote in biology has resulted in the tailoring of techniques for the cloning, exp ression, purification and characterisation of these somewhat intractable pr oteins and most notably in the optimisation of several alternative host sys tems for this purpose. This Review Article summarises the use of yeast as a host. Compared with other hosts, it is clear that yeast combines the advan tages of eukaryotes with the ease of handling of prokaryotes. Moreover, thi s organism provides membrane protein biologists with a panacea for structur e-function analyses, not least because the tools of yeast genetics are at t heir disposal.