Application and identification of monoclonal antibody targeting a novel epitope on p72 protein of African swine fever virus.

Abstract

African swine fever (ASF) is a kind of disease caused by African swine fever virus (ASFV), which has a very high mortality rate for pigs. The p72 protein is the capsid protein of ASFV, which has good antigenicity and reactogenicity, and is suitable for serological detection of ASFV. In the study, a truncated N-terminal (1-224aa) p72 recombinant protein was expressed in Escherichia coli, and monoclonal antibody (mAbs) 2C3 and rabbit polyclonal antibody were generated. The epitope (ITFALKPREEYQPSGH) was recognized by epitope mapping to mAbs 2C3. The identified epitope was highly conserved among 25 ASFV strains by sequence alignment analysis, and located on the surface of p72 protein by 3D structural analysis. Based on mAbs 2C3 and rabbit polyclonal antibody, a double antibody sandwich ELISA detection method was developed. The results showed that the method had good specificity, high sensitivity and great potential for ASFV diagnosis.