Custom Services

Custom Antibody Production

ProSci Incorporated has produced more than 10,000 custom monoclonal and custom polyclonal antibodies for researchers worldwide in academia, industry, diagnostics, and pharma. Operating our own animal facility and performing immunological services in-house allow us to tailor antibody production for almost any research need. With a capacity of more than 5,000 animals, no project is too large or too small. We look forward to assisting you with any aspect of the antibody production project, from choosing the ideal type of antibody and species for antibody production, recommending protein antigen conditions, or helping design both an antibody production protocol and an antigenicity-guaranteed peptide for your custom antibody production project. ProSci has the experience and expertise to help you develop the antibodies you need for your research needs.

Custom Polyclonal Antibody Production

We offer custom polyclonal antibody production packages that cover all scales of projects, from a single project for a researcher targeting one protein, to the long-term large scale production needed for diagnostics. Animals are placed on an initial immunization protocol and at the end of the period you have a three day screening period to evaluate the final scheduled bleeds. Animals can then be terminated at no additional cost, exsanguinated to harvest additional serum (~60mL per rabbit; $50), or placed on an extension schedule for longer-term production ($75 per month per animal for rabbit and chicken, $200 per month per animal for goat). Animals can be maintained on extension schedules for multiple years, allowing you to obtain as much anti-serum as is needed for your research.

ProSci can produce a custom polyclonal antibody using an antigen you provide (see requirements below), or help you to design a guaranteed peptide antigen that we can synthesize. We offer a variety of packages, including Peptide Cocktail Antibody Production and Phospho-Specific Antibody Production packages. We offer a wide range of antibody production services in three animal species:

• Rabbit
• Chicken
• Goat

Phospho-Specific Antibody Production

The most common peptide modification used for polyclonal antibody production is the phosphorylation of amino acids; which is accomplished immunizing host animals with a short synthetic peptide containing the phosphoryl (PO₃) group on the residue of interest. Phosphorylation events are integral to cellular regulation functions including:

• Activation of enzymes and receptors
• Cellular transcription
• Signal transduction
• Cell signaling networks

Custom phospho-specific antibody production can ensure that the peptide mimics the natural conformation and activity found in the protein. Phosphorylation often results in functional changes in the activity of a protein, and having antibodies recognizing the phosphorylated state (as well as the corresponding non-phosphorylated state) can be integral for studying protein pathways.

Peptide Cocktail Antibody Production

Need a quick approach to find a good polyclonal antibody, and don’t have recombinant protein available? Producing polyclonal antibodies using several peptides can be a good solution. However, separate immunization protocols can become very expensive, very quickly. ProSci offers packages for synthesizing, conjugating, and immunizing multiple peptides into one set of animals. Benefits of peptide cocktail antibody production include:

• Ability to characterize four or six antibodies to one protein (antibodies against your choice of two or three peptides in two animals)
• Higher likelihood of finding antibodies that work for multiple applications, particularly epitope-quantity specific applications such as immunoprecipitation
• Lower cost than separate protocols

Custom Monoclonal Antibody Development

ProSci can help you develop custom monoclonal antibodies and we understand researchers have varying needs for levels of involvement, depending on the target. We have developed monoclonal antibody development packages for different levels of involvement in the project, from researcher screening (you screen positive wells following fusion for clones of interest) to ProSci sending western blot and immunocytochemistry positive final clones. We offer custom monoclonal antibody development packages for both protein and peptide antigens.

ProSci’s fusion success rate for custom monoclonal antibody developement is greater than 95%, using techniques developed in-house. All work is performed by skilled technicians on premises in our San Diego, California laboratories. Your custom monoclonal antibody production project, and can be scaled up to almost any magnitude. We can screen against multiple antigens (additional charges apply) to develop the specific clone you need. ProSci has repeatedly proven our abilities to produce hybridomas against difficult targets.

We use 5 Balb/c mice as a production strain for hybridoma development. Balb/c is a very common species used throughout the industry for monoclonal antibody development due to their large spleen to body size ratio. This yields a higher number of spleenocytes at fusion.

Custom Monoclonal Antibody Production

ProSci now offers in-vitro cell culture for custom monoclonal antibody production. Our methods have demonstrated a 5-25 fold increase in yields over conventional monoclonal antibody cell culture techniques. Serum and serum-free medium formulations are available. Production usually takes 3-4 weeks depending upon the cell line. Purification using protein G or A is also available.

ProSci can produce antibody from a Balb/c-derived cell line through the production of ascites fluid. This is done by injecting the cell line into the primed peritoneal cavity of Balb/c mice, and harvesting the fluid. We can do this from a cell line produced through our custom monoclonal antibody production programs, or from a cell line you send to us.

Antigen Design

ProSci offers free antigen design assistance for peptide antigens. If you can provide us with the sequence (or protein accession number) our scientists will analyze your protein and select the regions which offer the best chance of eliciting an immune response.

Peptide Synthesis

ProSci can synthesize almost any custom peptide for your needs. We provide a high quality product in a fast timeline; this is our commitment to our clients.

PK Studies

ProSci offers cost effective, pharmacokinetic (PK) studies for evaluating absorption, distribution, metabolism, and immunogenicity of novel non-toxic formulations in rodents (mouse, rat, and rabbit). ProSci provides flexible choices for custom protocols, animal platforms, and study duration.

During these PK studies, animals receive excellent care from trained ProSci technicians. We can provide periodic blood draws for analysis, or end of study necropsy and harvest of tissue or organs.

ELISA Service

An ELISA is a simple method to assess whether an antibody response against the immunizing antigen has occurred. As the serum is diluted, the titer as determined by an ELISA service should continually decrease. Antibody is present when the ELISA titer is greater than or equal to 0.1, normalized against the pre-bleed. It is advantageous to have antibody at the highest possible dilution. For ELISA service, please note that titers will fluctuate over time, there are no predicable patterns. For example, a low ELISA titer may increase over time with additional boosts or it may not. Conversely, a high ELISA titer may be maintained over time, or it could decrease even with subsequent immunizations.

IHC Service

ProSci offers cost effective immunohistochemistry service (IHC service) and immunocytochemistry service (ICC service) for pharmaceutical, biotechnology and academic research institutes employing different methods of detection (fluorescence, alkaline phosphatase and peroxidase) on cells, paraffin and frozen tissue sections. Sections or arrays for IHC service can be provided by either the client or ProSci. Assays are routinely run by highly trained scientists with more than 15 years of experience in immunochemistry assay development and microscopic cell/tissue imaging analysis. Clients can use protocols developed by ProSci or propose their own methods for IHC Service. In addition to IHC service and ICC service, a HE staining service is also available upon request. As a routine matter, complex cases are reported with annotated digitally acquired image, incorporated into the histopathology report.

If you have any questions regarding our custom services please contact us at abservices@prosci-inc.com, or by calling toll-free 888.513.9525.