Summary
Novelty: A panel of highly specific and novel monoclonal antibodies for putative HCV envelope regions is disclosed. It provides a diagnostic tool for the acute stage of hepatitis C infections.
Biology: A sample with putative HCV antigens is contacted with a poly- or monoclonal anti-HCV envelope region antibody or fragment and incubated. Treatment with an indicator specific for HCV antigen attached to a compound generating a measurable signal enables the amount of HCV antigen to be determined. The compounds can be chromagens, enzymes, luminescent and chemiluminescent compounds, radioactive elements and direct visual labels. Three examples of assays are disclosed. Various body fluids can be used as test samples.
Chemistry: Synthetic peptides were synthesized by standard techniques. The amino acid sequence of the putative ENV domain of the HCV genome 380-486 was determined by standard techniques.
Structure: