Efficient Inhibition of Interfacial Nonspecific Interaction to Create Practically Utilizable High Ferritin-Response Immunolatex

Development of a high-performance immunolatex based on "soft landing" antibody immobilization mechanism

Rabbit anti-human ferritin (anti-hFT) polyclonal immunoglobulin G (IgG) and poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) were sequentially co-immobilized onto polystyrene submicroparticles (sMPs) to construct sMP/anti-hFT/PEG (SAP) immunolatex. Chemical immobilization of anti-hFT was performed at different pH levels to evaluate variations in antigen recognition. Basic pH disfavored conjugation of anti-hFT to sMPs, but remarkably increased its antigen recognition in comparison to that at neutral pH. We investigated this intriguing phenomenon further by assessing the kinetics of antibody binding, including the time-dependency of immobilization, antigen recognition, and orientation of bound anti-hFT. Therefore, we attributed high antigen recognition to significant electrostatic repulsion between sMPs and anti-hFT at basic pH, which predominately prevented anti-hFT access to sMPs and concurrently promoted anti-hFT orientations suitable for antigen recognition. Subsequent PEG modification maintained such anti-hFT orientation, without which antigen-accessible orientations would have decreased with time. Thus, properly oriented antibody and immediate PEGylation after antibody immobilization contributed to the formation of a high-performance SAP immunolatex.

Minimizing nonspecific protein adsorption in liquid crystal immunoassays by using surfactants

In this paper, we report the role of surfactants in minimizing nonspecific protein adsorption in liquid crystal (LC)-based immunoassays in which LC is used as a readout system. Among all surfactants tested, only nonionic surfactant such as Tween 20 can effectively reduce the nonspecific protein adsorption, while maintaining the selectivity of the LC-based immunoassay. We also show that to minimize nonspecific protein adsorption, Tween 20 can be added directly into the antibody solution to a final concentration of 0.8 mM. After the addition of Tween 20, better correlations between the antibody concentrations and the interference colors of LCs can therefore be obtained. For example, when Cy3 antibiotin was used, black, yellow, red, and green interference colors correspond to a concentration of 5, 25, 50, and 100 μg/mL, respectively. This feature gives LC immunoassay a unique advantage over the fluorescence-based immunoassay.