The production of a recombinant p36 protein (p36) from the human immunodeficiency virus-2 (HIV-2) (plasmid pVIHTA-2, tryptophan promoter) in Escherichia coli K-12 (E. coli) C-600 using fed-batch culture was studied. The nutrient feeding rates were found to substantially affect the specific p36 yield. A final productivity of 61 mg p36/(l . h) and cell dry weight of 10 g/l were obtained when the fed-batch cultivation conditions were optimized, compared to 24 mg p36/(l . h) and 3 g/l, respectively, in batch cultivation. The fermentation process was successfully scaled up to 50 l cultures.