GFP vs YFP: Difference and Comparison

The deepest portion of a sea or ocean does not get the facility of sunlight even in the daytime. The organisms which reside in the deepest portion of the sea or ocean have the advantage of light in their body by nature.

This characteristic in animals is called bioluminescence. This helps them to prey and also sometimes hide from predators. Some also use this as we use a torch.

The chemical that helps to create this luminescence is different in every organism. The Aequorea victoria is a jellyfish that poses GFP for bioluminescence.

To know more about this protein, here are some differences between GFP and YFP.

Key Takeaways

1. GFP (Green Fluorescent Protein) emits green light when exposed to blue light, while YFP (Yellow Fluorescent Protein) emits yellow light.
2. GFP has a higher fluorescence intensity than YFP.
3. YFP is less sensitive to pH changes than GFP.

GFP vs YFP

GFP (Green Fluorescent Protein) is present in jellyfish. It produces green light when exposed to blur UV rays. Its excitation peak is 395nm, and the emission peak is 515nm. YFP (Yellow Fluorescent Protein) has an excitation wavelength of 514 nm and an emission wavelength of 527 nm.

The full form of GFP is Green Fluorescent Protein. It is found in a jellyfish known as Aequorea Victoria.

The main characteristic of GFP is that it emits green fluorescence when exposed to blur ultraviolet rays. This protein consists of 238 amino acids.

It also has some improved versions, which are mainly used for experiments. These are used to produce new cell and molecular biology genes.

The full form of YFP is Yellow Fluorescent Protein. It is the muted version of the Green Fluorescent Protein found in Aequorea Victoria.

This protein emits yellow fluorescence when exposed to blue UV rays. This has three improved versions.

Those are Ypet, Citrine, and Venus. This protein is also used for experiments in cells and molecular biology.

Comparison Table

Parameters of Comparison	GFP	YFP
Full form	Green Fluorescent Protein	Yellow Fluorescent Protein
Derived from	Aequorea Victoria, which is a type of jellyfish	The genetic mutant of Green Fluorescent Protein
Excitation peak (wavelength)	395 nm	515 nm
Emission peak (wavelength)	509 nm	527 nm
Improved versions	smRS-GFP	Ypet, Citrine, Venus

What is GFP?

The full form of GFP is Green Fluorescent Protein. It is found in a jellyfish known as Aequorea Victoria.

The main characteristic of GFP is that it emits green fluorescence when exposed to blur ultraviolet rays.

This protein consists of 238 amino acids. Its molecular mass is 27kD. It also has some improved versions, which are mainly used for experiments.

 This protein has the fluorescence wavelengths of emission type and excitation type. The emission peak is the range at which the ray is emitted, and the excitation peak is when the photons get excited and start to emit light.

The excitation peak is 395nm, and the emission peak is 515nm.

 GFP has major applications in the research of cells and molecules. Scientists use this protein as a reporter gene in cells and the molecular.

The reporter gene is a type of gene that is attached to another gene that is used for the experiment in sequence and is easily identified with respect to the main gene. This is used as a reporter gene because of its bioluminescence characteristics.

This protein has many other advantages as well. This gene is hereditary and does not react with other genes biologically. So for research, this gene is mostly preferred.

What is YFP?

The full form of YFP is Yellow Fluorescent Protein. It is the muted version of the Green Fluorescent Protein found in Aequorea Victoria.

This protein emits yellow fluorescence when exposed to blue UV rays. This has three improved versions.

Those are Ypet, Citrine, and Venus. This protein is also used for experiments in microbiology.

The Yellow Fluorescent Protein is formed after four mutations of the wild variety of Green Fluorescent Protein found in the deep sea jellyfish Aequorea Victoria. The main and most important changes of the mutation are the replacement of threonine with another chemical called tyrosine at the position of 203.

This change gave birth to the YFP variant. The excitation peak of YFP is 515nm, and the emission peak is 527 nm. Both peaks are higher with respect to the parent GFP.

The improved versions of the YFP which are Ypet, Citrine, and Venus, have some more advantages than their parent protein. Those are that these improved variants have faster maturation, increased luminescence, and reduced sensitivity to chloride with respect to the parent YFP.

The YFP is also used in the field of cell and molecular biology. The YFP is mainly used as acceptors for the genetically encoded sensor genes.

The Venus variant has a change in the novel amino acid sequence.

Main Differences Between GFP and YFP

1. The full forms of GFP are Green Fluorescent Protein, whereas YFP is Yellow Fluorescent Protein.
2. The GFP is derived from a jellyfish called Aequorea victoria, while the YFP is the mutant variant of the GFP.
3. The excitation peak in the wavelength of GFP is 395nm, while that of YFP is 515nm.
4. The emission peak of GFP in wavelengths is 509nm, whereas that of YFP is 527nm.
5. The improved versions for facilitating the research of GFP are smRS-GFP, while that of YFP is Ypet, Citrine, and Venus.

References

1. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960982202004839
2. https://www.nature.com/articles/nmeth1105-801

Last Updated : 11 June, 2023