A sensitive epitope-blocking ELISA for the detection of Chikungunya virus-specific antibodies in patients
Date
2015
Authors
Goh, L.Y.H.
Kam, Y.W.
Metz, S.W.
Hobson Peters, J.
Prow, N.A.
McCarthy, S.
Smith, D.W.
Pijlman, G.P.
Ng, L.F.P.
Hall, R.A.
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Journal article
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Journal of Virological Methods, 2015; 222:55-61
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Abstract
Chikungunya fever (CHIKF) has re-emerged as an arboviral disease that mimics clinical symptoms of other diseases such as dengue, malaria, as well as other alphavirus-related illnesses leading to problems with definitive diagnosis of the infection. Herein we describe the development and evaluation of a sensitive epitope-blocking ELISA (EB-ELISA) capable of specifically detecting anti-chikungunya virus (CHIKV) antibodies in clinical samples. The assay uses a monoclonal antibody (mAb) that binds an epitope on the E2 protein of CHIKV and does not exhibit cross-reactivity to other related alphaviruses. We also demonstrated the use of recombinant CHIK virus-like particles (VLPs) as a safe alternative antigen to infectious virions in the assay. Based on testing of 60 serum samples from patients in the acute or convalescent phase of CHIKV infection, the EB-ELISA provided us with 100% sensitivity, and exhibited 98.5% specificity when Ross River virus (RRV)- or Barmah Forest virus (BFV)-immune serum samples were included. This assay meets the public health demands of a rapid, robust, sensitive and specific, yet simple assay for specifically diagnosing CHIK-infections in humans.
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Copyright 2015 Elsevier