When Recombinant Antibodies Meet Polyclonal Antibodies

Polyclonal antibodies are a collection of antibodies that are derived from B cells and recognize multiple epitopes on the same antigen. By comparing, monoclonal antibodies are derived from a single B cell and only bind with one epitope. Therefore some monoclonal mixture of individual antibody is literally a polyclonal antibody.

What’s the difference? To answer the question, the first step is to explore the production of antibodies. If using immunized splenocytes of animals, hybridoma is obtained, a monoclonal antibody, if using the animal's serum, a polyclonal antibody is obtained. But in theory, these antibodies should against antigens, for example, if employing a human antigen to an immunized mouse, then these antibodies is mouse anti-human. Since a large protein molecule has multiple epitopes on the surface, after immunizing, these different determinants will induce animals generating different antibodies with different specificity.

Monoclonal antibody is secreted by a single cell and only is against a single antigen protein, while polyclonal antibody has a plurality of different multi-resistant clones of B cells, is a mixture of a variety of cells, and each of its antibody is also against a single antigen protein. The ability of polyclonal antibody binding to antigen for each of its antibody varies. This is one of its advantages over monoclonal antibody, to ensure the antibody-antigen binds. But there are also disadvantages, such as cross-reactivity, often resulting in false positive. Theoretically human antigen-induced antibodies should only be used for humans, but the cross-animal species, in particular between similar animals, such as humans and chimpanzees, rat and mouse which is homology will lead to antibody cross-reactivity, i.e., animal A antigen-induced antibody can also react with animal B. Usually this will be pointed out for a commercial products. In return, since monoclonal antibody only against a single antigenic determinant, therefore, it is less possible to lead to cross-reactivity.

In more specific conclusion, polyclonal antibodies are inexpensive and quick to produce. They are easy to store and highly stable and tolerant of pH or buffer changes. Generally they have higher antibody affinity and greater sensitivity. They are ideal in Sandwich ELISA, IP or ChIP. While in terms of monoclonal antibodies, they can produce large quantities of identical antibody, less cross reactivity and offer better results in assays requiring quantification of the protein levels.

For those reasons, one can choose to use which antibodies accordingly, for example, for applications of diagnostic manufacturing and therapeutic drug development, one might need monoclonal antibodies; for general research, one might need polyclonal antibodies.

Creative Diagnostics has been an antibody expert for many years. Its leading position in this industry allows it to offer thousands of monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies and conjugates validated for use in a variety of common applications, including Western blot, Flow cytometry, IHC, ICC, IF, IP, and more. Creative Diagnostics also offers secondary antibodies, bulk production, and custom purification, formulations or conjugations to meet various research needs.

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Created on Dec 31st 1969 18:00. Viewed 0 times.

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