Species-specificity of a panel of prion protein antibodies for the immunohistochemical study of animal and human prion diseases.

Monoclonal antibodies to the prion protein (PrP) have been of critical importance in the neuropathological characterization of PrP-related disease in men and animals. To determine the influence of species-specific amino-acid substitutions recognized by monoclonal antibodies, and to investigate the immunohistochemical reactivity of the latter, analyses were carried out on brain sections of cattle with bovine spongiform encephalopathy, sheep with scrapie, mice infected with scrapie, and human beings with Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) or Gerstmann-Sträussler-Sheinker disease (GSS). Immunoreactivity varied between the antibodies, probably as the result of differences in the amino-acid sequence of the prion protein in the various species. Some monoclonal antibodies against mouse recombinant PrP gave strong signals with bovine, ovine and human PrP(Sc), in addition to murine PrP(Sc), even though the amino-acid sequences determined by the antibody epitope are not fully identical with the amino-acid sequences proper to the species. On the other hand, in certain regions of the PrP sequence, when the species-specificity of the antibodies is defined by one amino-acid substitution, the antibodies revealed no reactivity with other animal species. In the region corresponding to positions 134-159 of murine PrP, immunohistochemical reactivity or species-specificity recognized by the antibodies may be determined by one amino acid corresponding to position 144 of murine PrP. Not all epitopes recognized by a monoclonal antibody play an important role in antigen-antibody reactions in immunohistochemistry. The presence of the core epitope is therefore vital in understanding antibody binding ability.