1999•Revista do Instituto de Medicina Tropical de São PauloOpen access
ANALYSIS OF Treponema pallidum RECOMBINANT ANTIGENS FOR DIAGNOSIS OF SYPHILIS BY WESTERN BLOTTING TECHNIQUE
Neuza Satomi Sato, Mário Hiroyuki Hirata, Rosário Dominguez Crespo Hirata, Lia Carmen M. S. Zerbini, Edilene Peres Real da Silveira, Carmen Silvia de Melo, Mirthes Ueda
Open full text 17 citations
Abstract
Three GST fusion recombinant antigen of Treponema pallidum, described as GST-rTp47, GST-rTp17 and GST-rTp15 were analyzed by Western blotting techniques. We have tested 53 serum samples: 25 from patients at different clinical stages of syphilis, all of them presenting anti-treponemal antibody, 25 from healthy blood donors and three from patients with sexually transmitted disease (STD) other than syphilis. Almost all samples from patients with syphilis presented a strong reactivity with GST-rTp17 antigen. Some samples were non-reactive or showed a weak reaction with GST-rTp47 and/or GST-rTp15, and apparently there was no correlation with the stage of disease. There was no seropositivity among blood donors. No sample reacted with purified GST. We concluded that due to their specificity these recombinant antigens can be used as GST fusion protein for development of syphilis diagnostic assays.
Open-access reader