The use of nitrocellulose blotting for the study of hepatitis B surface antigen electrophoresed in agarose gels [L'utilisation de l'electrophorèse par nitrocellulose pour l'étude de l'antigène de surface de l'hépatite B par électrophorèse en gels d'agarose].

Résumé

Nitrocellulose-protein blotting of serum electrophoresed in agarose gels has been adapted for the study of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg),125I-labeled anti-HBs was used as the antigen probe, and the electrophoretic migration was monitored by autoradiography. The method required 3 microliter or less of serum and could detect as little as 1 pg of purified HBsAg. Typically, we observed two bands of HbsAg, a moving band which migrated about one-third the distance moved by human serum albumin and a non-migratory band which remained at the loading site. Some examples of the use of the method include: (1) empirical methods for correlating HBsAg concentration in serum to film darkness (2) observations of mobility changes in serial sera from dialysis patients with chronic HBsAg antigenemia and (3) detection of related antigens such as antigen from the PLC/PRF/5 hepatoma tissue culture line and the cross-reacting woodchuck patients hepatitis virus surface antigen (WHsAg).