Antibody profiling identifies novel antigenic targets in spinal cord injury patients

This study used a technique called serological antigen selection (SAS) to find new antibody targets in patients with spinal cord injury (SCI). A cDNA phage display library from human spinal cord tissue was created and screened for antibody reactivity in plasma samples from SCI patients. The SAS approach identified a panel of 19 antigenic targets to which antibodies in the SCI patients' plasma reacted. Further validation in additional SCI patients and healthy controls confirmed elevated antibody levels to several of these targets in a significant portion of the SCI cohort. The identification of these novel antigenic targets may provide new insights into the disease processes of SCI and could lead to the development of antibody biomarkers for SCI patients.

• 1
  Nineteen antigenic targets with increased reactivity in SCI patients were identified using serological antigen selection (SAS).
• 2
  Antibody reactivity against 9 of the 19 novel targets was validated in an additional cohort of SCI patients.
• 3
  A panel of 6 targets showed immunoreactivity in approximately half of the SCI patients (47 %) with a specificity of 82 %.