Rapid serological profiling by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. I. Measurement of antibody activity titer against Newcastle disease virus in a single serum dilution

Abstract

An enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) was developed to measure specific antibody activity in sera of chickens exposed to Newcastle disease virus (NDV). A near-linear relationship existed between the log of the corrected absorbance of antisera at a single working dilution and the corresponding observed serum titers as determined by a standard serial-dilution method. Regression analysis was used to construct a standard curve and extract an equation from this relationship. The equation was used to convert corrected absorbance readings of the single working dilution directly into predicted ELISA antibody activity titers. In a comparative study, a correlation (P less than 0.01) was found between ELISA and hemagglutination-inhibition (HI) antibody titers to NDV. ELISA titers were as much as 160 times greater than the HI titers. ELISA was also able to detect much lower levels of antibody activity than the HI test.