Immunoblotting and Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay

Immunoassay using antibodies bound to a solid phase was first described in 1954 when D. W. Talmage and coworkers used a crude form of radioimmunoassay (RIA) to estimate the total antibody content of serum (1 ). Various technological developments, notably the coupling of enzymes to antibodies, allowed enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELIBA) techniques as used today to be developed. A further major advance was the technique of transfer of proteins from electrophoretic gels to nitrocellulose sheets, and the subsequent probing of the sheets with antibodies—the Western blot, developed in its modern form by Towbin and coworkers in 1979 (2 ).