Photo Credit: membio
The following is a summary of “Development and validation of a novel enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay for the differentiation of tick-borne encephalitis infections caused by different virus subtypes,” published in the August 2024 issue of Infectious Disease by Freimane et al.
Tick-borne encephalitis (TBE) is caused by tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV), which leads to symptoms of central nervous system inflammation. There are five subtypes of TBEV, 3 of which are European, Siberian, and Far Eastern occurring in Europe.
Researchers conducted a retrospective study to achieve serological differentiation of TBEV subtypes, exhibiting different clinical courses and outcomes.
They used an ELISA format based on NS1 antigen against European, Siberian, and Far Eastern subtypes. 3 NS1 antigens were produced in a human cell line and used for ELISA coating; Sera from German (European subtype) and Russian (Siberian and Far Eastern subtypes) patients with TBE had positive TBEV IgG, used for testing reactivity against 3 NS1 antigens.
The results showed that ELISA could differentiate between TBEV European subtype and TBEV Siberian and Far Eastern subtype infections.
Researchers concluded that NS1-IgG ELISA is an important diagnostic tool for distinguishing between European and Siberian/Far Eastern subtype infections.
Source: link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s15010-024-02370-2
