Immunoassay enzyme label

The modification of electrodes with enzymes and other biological macromolecules was well underway before 1978, and a detailed history of this field is beyond the scope of the present paper. A brief discussion of biological systems is given, however, to place them in context with other modification layers. A recent review by Frew and Hill (121) discusses past and future strategies for design of electrochemical biosensors. Topics discussed were enzyme electrodes, electron transfer mediators, conducting salts, electrochemical immunoassay, enzyme labels, and cell-based biosensors. In general, the bioactive molecule or cell is immobilized in proximity to an electrochemical transducer and exposed to the analyte solution for real-time analysis. 

Chemiluminescence and bioluminescence are also used in immunoassays to detect conventional enzyme labels (eg, alkaline phosphatase, P-galactosidase, glucose oxidase, glucose 6-phosphate dehydrogenase, horseradish peroxidase, microperoxidase, xanthine oxidase). The enhanced chemiluminescence assay for horseradish peroxidase (luminol-peroxide-4-iodophenol detection reagent) and various chemiluminescence adamantyl 1,2-dioxetane aryl phosphate substrates, eg, (11) and (15) for alkaline phosphatase labels are in routine use in immunoassay analyzers and in Western blotting kits (261—266). 

Enzyme Immunosensors. Enzyme immunosensors are enzyme immunoassays coupled with electrochemical sensors. These sensors (qv) require multiple steps for analyte determination, and either sandwich assays or competitive binding assays maybe used. Both of these assays use antibodies for the analyte of interest attached to a membrane on the surface of an electrochemical sensor. In the sandwich assay type, the membrane-bound antibody binds the sample antigen, which in turn binds another antibody that is enzyme-labeled. This immunosensor is then placed in a solution containing the substrate for the labeling enzyme and the rate of product formation is measured electrochemically. The rate of the reaction is proportional to the amount of bound enzyme and thus to the amount of the analyte antigen. The sandwich assay can be used only with antigens capable of binding two different antibodies simultaneously (53). 

Conventional ion-selective electrodes have been used as detectors for immunoassays. Antibody binding measurements can be made with hapten-selective electrodes such as the trimethylphenylammonium ion electrode Enzyme immunoassays in which the enzyme label catalyzes the production of a product that is detected by an ion-selective or gas-sensing electrode take advantage of the amplification effect of enzyme catalysis in order to reach lower detection limits. Systems for hepatitis B surface antigen and estradiol use horseradish peroxidase as the enzyme label and... 

Catalase has also been used as an enzyme label in competitive heterogeneous enzyme immunoassays. Catalase generates oxygen from hydrogen peroxide with the oxygen determined amperometrically with an oxygen electrode. This approach has been demonstrated for a-fetoprotein theophylline and human serum albumin... 

A sandwich electrochemical enzyme immunoassay has been described for IgG Alkaline phosphatase was again used as the enzyme label with the conversion of phenyl phosphate to phenol being determined electrochemically by LCEC. A detection limit of 10 pg/mL was reported. 

A homogeneous electrochemical enzyme immunoassay for 2,4-dinitrophenol-aminocaproic acid (DNP-ACA), has been developed based on antibody inhibition of enzyme conversion from the apo- to the holo- form Apoglucose oxidase was used as the enzyme label. This enzyme is inactive until binding of flavin adenine dinucleotide (FAD) to form the holoenzyme which is active. Hydrogen peroxide is the enzymatic product which is detected electrochemically. Because antibody bound apoenzyme cannot bind FAD, the production of HjOj is a measure of the concentration of free DNP-ACA in the sample. 

Another commonly used ELISA format is the immobilized antibody assay or direct competitive assay (Eigure 3). The primary anti-analyte antibody is immobilized on the solid phase and the analyte competes with a known amount of enzyme-labeled hapten for binding sites on the immobilized antibody. Eirst, the anti-analyte antibody is adsorbed on the microtiter plate wells. In the competition step, the analyte and enzyme-labeled hapten are added to microtiter plate wells and unbound materials are subsequently washed out. The enzyme substrate is then added for color production. Similarly to indirect competitive immunoassay, absorption is inversely proportional to the concentration of analyte. The direct competitive ELISA format is commonly used in commercial immunoassay test kits. 

Figure 4 Sandwich immunoassay. A capture antibody (Y) is passively adsorbed on a solid phase. The target protein contained in the sample and the enzyme-labeled reporter antibody (Y-E) are added. Both the capture antibody and enzyme-labeled reporter antibody bind to the target protein at different sites, sandwiching it between the antibodies. Following a wash step, the substrate (<>) is added and colored product ( ) formed. The amount of colored product is directly proportional to the amount of target protein captured...

For indirect immunoassay methods, the antigen (analyte) is bound to support materials and excess binding sites are blocked. Analyte and primary antibody are then added simultaneously, followed by the addition of enzyme-labeled secondary antibody and color reagent. The bound analyte (coating antigen) and free analyte (in... 

Figure 1 Schematic sequence of the direct and indirect competitive ELISA. The principle difference is that for direct competitive immunoassay, the well is coated with primary antibody directly, and for indirect competitive immunoassay, the well is coated with antigen. Primary antibody (Y), blocking protein (Y), analyte (T), analyte-tracer ( ), enzyme labeled secondary antibody ), color development ( J)...

In a direct immunoassay the immobilized antibody binds to the corresponding antigen. The competitive immunoassay relies upon the competition of the analyte with a labelled analyte for antibody binding. These formats are widely used for high throughput affinity arrays. A sandwich immunoassay is based on the trapping or capture of the analyte by another antibody. In ELISA (enzyme linked immunosorbent assays) the second antibody is conjugated with an enzyme. The bound enzyme labelled antibody is detected by its ability to break down its substrate to a colored product. 

Ishikawa, E., Yamada, Y., and Yoshitake, S. (1981a) Enzyme labeling with N,N -o-phenylenedimaleimide. In Enzyme Immunoassay (E. Ishikawa, T. Kawai, and K. Miyazi, eds.), pp. 67-80. Tokyo. 

FIGURE 5.6 Schematic representation of the immunosensor based on a Protein A-GEB biocomposite as a transducer, (a) Immobilization of RlgG on the surface via interaction with Protein A, (b) competitive immunoassay using anti-RIgG and biotinylated anti-RIgG, (c) enzyme labeling using HRP-streptavidin and (d) electrochemical enzyme activity determination. (Reprinted from [31] with permission from Elsevier.)... 

Ishikawa, E., Hashida, S., Kohno, T. and Tanaka, K. Methods for enzyme-labeling of antigens, antibodies and their fragments , in Ngo, T. T. (ed.), Nonisotopic Immunoassay. Plenum Press, New York, 1988, p. 37. 

Figure 7.15 Enzyme-multiplied immunoassay (EMIT). The three reactants, test (or standard) antigen, enzyme-labelled antigen and a limited amount of antibody are allowed to react and reach an equilibrium position. The unbound labelled antigen which remains is the only source of enzyme activity, the bound enzyme being inactivated. This free enzyme can be quantitated using a direct kinetic assay method and is proportional to the amount of unlabelled antigen originally present.

E. Ishikawa, M. Imagawa, S. Hashida, S. Yoshitake, Y. Hamaguchi, andT. Ueno, Enzyme-labeling of antibodies and their fragments for enzyme immunoassay and immunohistochemical staining, J. Immunoassay 4, 209-327 (1983). 

Other immunoassays are based on the same antibody-antigen binding reaction but use a different labeling system for detection. Instead of an enzyme label, there are radioactive isotopes, and fluorescent and luminescent labels. Some important immunoassays are defined below ... 

Fluoroimmunoassays comprise a subclass of extrinsic labehng methods where various selective antigen (Ag)- antibody (Ab) immunoassay fluorescent labeling schemes yield a emission signal. One common scheme involves an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) depicted in Figure 11.2 where the free Ab is tagged with a fluorophore. Numerous analytes can be detected via these types of selective lock-and-key methods. ... 

Certain drugs such as chloramphenicol require additional tests for their detection and quantification in meat tissues. The Competitive Enzyme Labeled Immunoassay for Chloramphenicol (CELIA) was developed and is used by FSIS laboratories to detect and quantify this drug in the meat supply chloramphenicol is not approved for use in food animals. CELIA detects 5 ppb chloramphenicol in tissue extracts. 

Enzyme Multiplied Immunoassay Technique (EMIT). This technique employs enzyme-labelled antibiotics which react analogously to the fluroimmunoassay in that a reduction of enzjrme activity is attributed to antibody binding. Higher concentrations of unlabelled drug in the sample result in less enzyme-labelled drug bound to the antibody. 

Methods based on chemiluminescent and bioluminescent labels are another area of nonisotopic immunoassays that continue to undergo active research. Most common approaches in this category are the competitive binding chemiluminescence immunoassays and the immunochemiluminometric assays. Chemiluminescence and heterogenous chemiluminescence immunoassays have been the subject of excellent reviews (91, 92). Detection in chemiluminescence immunoassays is based on either the direct monitoring of conjugated labels, such as luminol or acridinium ester, or the enzyme-mediated formation of luminescent products. Preparation of various derivatives of acridinium esters has been reported (93, 94), whereas a variety of enzyme labels including firefly or bacterial luciferase (70), horseradish peroxidase (86, 98), and alkaline phosphatase are commercially available. 

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