Recombinant Expression of Bornavirus P24 Protein for Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay Development
Abstract:
BDV is a neurotropic enveloped RNA virus that induces persistent neurologic disease in a wide
host range, including several vertebrate species and humans. The BDV genome encodes six proteins but the P24 protein was identified at higher rates than other proteins in BDV-infected tissues.
In this study, BDV-P24 protein was constructed and subcloned into expression plasmid pET22.
Recombinant protein expression was confirmed by SDS-PAGE and western blotting. P24 protein was injected into rabbits with the aim of polyclonal antibody production and immunization.
ELISA is a fast, cost-effective, and highly sensitive technique with a lower probability of contamination compared to other diagnostic methods. ELISA was performed to evaluate infection in
laboratory rabbits and retrospective infection was examined in 50 rabbits. The obtained results in
this study indicated that ELISA based on P24 protein has a high potential to detect BDV infection.