Foot and mouth disease (FMD) is one of the major causes of economic loss of cloven-hoofed animals in the world today, state Li-na Ma of Lanzhou Veterinary Research Institute at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and colleagues in a paper recently published in Virology Journal.

The assessment of dominant genotype/lineage and prevalent trends and confirmation the presence of infection or vaccination not only provides scientific basis and first-hand information for appropriate control measure but also for disease eradication and regaining FMD-free status following an outbreak.

The researchers say that although different biological and serological approaches are still applied to study this disease, the ELISA test based on the distinct format, antigen type and specific antibody reinforce its predominance in different research areas of FMD, and this may replace the traditional methods in the near future.

Their review gives comprehensive insight on ELISA currently available for typing, antigenic analysis, vaccination status differentiation and surveillance vaccine purity and content at all stages of manufacture in FMDV. In addition, the researcher offer their viewpoint about the recent advances and trends of ELISA reagent for FMD are described here.

More than 100 studies regarding ELISA method available for FMD diagnosis, antigenic analysis and monitor were thoroughly reviewed. The Lanzhou researchers investigated previous scientific results of these tests on their sensitivity and specificity.

They found that in all ELISA formats for FMD, antibody-trapping and competitive ELISAs have high specificity and RT-PCR (oligoprobing) ELISA has extra sensitivity. A panel of monoclonal antibodies to different sites or monoclonal antibody in combination of antiserum is the most suitable combination of antibodies in ELISA for FMD. Even though from its beginning, 3ABC is proven to be best performance in many studies, no single NSP can differentiate infected from vaccinated animals with complete confidence. Meanwhile, recombinant antigens and peptide derived from FMDV NPs, and NSPs have been developed for use as an alternative to the inactivated virus antigen for security.

Ma and co-authors conclude that there is a need of target protein, which accurately determines the susceptible animal status based on the simple, fast and reliable routine laboratory test. A further alternative based on virus-like particle (VLP, also called empty capsids) in combination of high throughput antibody technique (Phage antibody library/antibody microarray) may be the powerful ELISA diagnostic reagents in future.

Reference

Ma L., J. Zhang, H. Chen, J. Zhou, Y. Ding and Y. Liu. 2011. An overview on ELISA techniques for FMD. Virology Journal, 8:419. doi:10.1186/1743-422X-8-419

Further Reading

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Further Reading

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