ELISA is a widely used technique for detecting concentration of proteins, using antibodies tagged with enzyme which react with dyes to produce a colorimetric or fluorescent signal. Sandwich Elisa takes this one step further, by pre-coating plastic wells with a known concentration of a “capture” antibody which reacts specifically to the antigen under test. A secondary antibody is then applied, tagged with an enzyme.
Recently, we at Novus Biologicals added a range of Biosensis ELISA kits to our antibody catalog, covering a wide range of antigens important to human disease research. Among them is human BDNF – a protein which was recently in the news as it appeared to have a stress-reducing and possible tumour-reducing effect in cancerous mice subjected to exercise.
BDNF, or Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor, is a member of the neurotrophin growth factor (NGF) family of proteins. Its function is to regulate neuronal differentiation and survival during embryonic development, and to regulate the plasticity and transmission of CNS synapses in the adult. Its expression is affected by stress, seizures, hypoglycaemia and other conditions, and it has been linked to CNS disorders like Alzheimer’s, depression, epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease.
Our human BDNF sandwich ELISA kit is a highly sensitive, reproducible method of determining BDNF levels in a range of sera. It contains a strip-plate of 96 wells, pre-coated with polyclonal human BDNF capture antibody. Addition of test sera creates an antibody-antigen complex. Biotinylated BDNF monoclonal detection antibody is then added, which also binds to the antigen (hence the “sandwich.”) ABC (Avidin-Biotin-Peroxidase) enzyme complex then binds to this second antibody. Finally, TMB peroxidase substrate reacts with the ABC component to create a detectable coloured dye reaction, the intensity of which is proportional to the concentration of BDNF in the samples.
Tags: Antibodies, Antibody catalog, Antibody database, Antibody suppliers