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Clinical and Diagnostic Laboratory Immunology, January 2002, p. 156-159, Vol. 9, No. 1
1071-412X/01/$04.00+0 DOI: 10.1128/CDLI.9.1.156-159.2002
Copyright © 2002, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Unité des Rickettsies, CNRS UMR 6020, Faculté de Médecine de Marseille, 13385 Marseille Cedex 05, France
Received 2 July 2001/ Returned for modification 26 September 2001/ Accepted 15 October 2001
Recent isolation of Tropheryma whipplei (formerly Trophyrema whippelii), the agent of Whipples disease, from the cardiac valve of a patient with Whipples disease endocarditis now allows the detection of reactive epitopes that could be used in a serological assay. In order to propose an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) that uses recombinant T. whipplei antigen, we first determined by Western blotting of human, mouse, and rabbit antisera that the common immunodominant epitope is an 84-kDa protein. We then produced 13 monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) against T. whipplei, 12 of which recognize this immunodominant epitope. These MAbs did not react with phylogenetically closely related bacteria or bacteria previously shown to be cross-reactive with T. whipplei, but they did react with two other strains of T. whipplei isolated, one from an ocular sample and the other from a duodenal biopsy specimen. By confocal microscopy, the MAbs allowed detection of T. whipplei within infected fibroblasts. The identification of the 84-kDa antigen with our MAbs will make it possible to develop a diagnostic antigen for use in a diagnostic ELISA for Whipples disease.
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