Research areas for which we frequently recommend Mabtech’s kits include infectious disease, cancer, allergy, transplantation and vaccine monitoring, and we also endorse Mabtech antibodies for cardiovascular and veterinary research.
Researchers with an interest in immune monitoring regularly turn to us as a source of Mabtech ELISpot kits, especially those who have invested in Mabtech’s IRIS™ ELISpot reader. One question we’re often asked is ‘what are the main differences between Mabtech’s ELISpot, FluoroSpot and ELISA kits?’. While all these products are based on the same high-quality Mabtech antibodies, they differ in terms of configuration.
Mabtech ELISAs are performed within a standard microplate, typically resulting in a colorimetric readout, whereas during a Mabtech ELISpot assay the microplate wells contain a PVDF membrane coated with a capture antibody to quantify cytokine-releasing cells. The FluoroSpot assay builds on the ELISpot principle by providing the capacity to analyze the secretion of multiple analytes from the same cell.
The ELISA assay relies on the antibodies that capture and detect the analyte of target. We at Mabtech put a lot of effort into developing and characterizing the antibodies. The antibody clones are often the same as in ELISpot, a method that requires optimal sensitivity and specificity of the antibodies involved. We always validate the ELISAs for recognition of native proteins as it often differs from how the antibodies bind to the recombinant protein. The use of quality antibodies makes our ELISAs both very specific and sensitive.