About 50 Papers Cited the Use of GFP-Trap Camelid Antibody So Far in 2011

With their ability to quantitatively pulldown GFP-tagged proteins, GFP-Trap (or RFP-Trap for DsRed-derived fluorescent proteins) beads have gained ground in becoming the reagent of choice for immuno-coprecipitation. The complexes isolated from GFP-Trap agarose or magnetic beads can be easily analyzed without interference from light or heavy IgG chains typically present after monoclonal or polyclonal antibody precipitation. Since the market launch of GFP-Trap, in each of the past 3 years, the number of publications citing GFP-Trap more has than doubled and there is no sign of that rate slowing down any time soon.

In 2011 alone, 48 research groups have published their results with data generated through use of GFP-Trap (not including other related products such as GFP-Booster, GFP-MultiTrap). Research topics in these recent publications include identification of domains of the zinc finger protein 638 (ZNF638) that interacts with C/EBP? when promoting adipocyte differentiation [1]; identification of phosphorylation site on Cdc42-associated kinase (Ack) by LC-MS/MS after immunoprecipitation [2]; and analysis of the activities of myosin heavy-chain kinases (MHCKs) in wild-type vs Htt mutant Dictyostelium discoideum, a cellular model for studying the Huntingon disease [3].

The use of GFP-Trap beads is a simple bind-wash-elute procedure that involves just one antibody already immobilized on either agarose or magnetic beads. Camelid antibodies, especially their VHH single domain fragments such as those used in GFP-Trap or RFP-Trap, are very stable (they can be shipped and temporarily stored at room temperature). The consistency of performance is very high; as a matter of fact, this line of products requires the lowest amount of technical support among all of our products. If you are still using tags like FLAG, V5, HA, etc., you should consider trying GFP as both a fluorescence and co-IP tag in your future experiments for obtaining results you previously could not obtain.

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Blog References:
[1] Meruvu, S. et al. “Regulation of Adipocyte Differentiation by the Zinc Finger Protein ZNF638″ JBC 2011
[2] Shen, H. et al. “Constitutive activated Cdc42-associated kinase (Ack) phosphorylation at arrested endocytic clathrin-coated pits of cells that lack dynamin” Molecular Biology of the Cell 2011
[3] Wang, Y. et al. “Dictyostelium huntingtin controls chemotaxis and cytokinesis through the regulation of myosin II phosphorylation” Molecular Biology of the Cell 2011

Allele Annouces New Products Based on Camelid Antibodies

090209 San Diego—Allele Biotech formally announced today that it has signed an agreement to distribute products from ChromoTek GmbH, a German company with a focus on camelid antibody fragment based precipitation and detection reagents. Single-domain antigen binding fragment, also called VHH or nanobody, can be derived from heavy chain-only antibodies produced by animals in the camel family. The small size and special structures of VHH enable their efficient binding into areas not normally accessible to larger IgG antibodies. Although GFP is a commonly used tag in fusion proteins for imaging, it has not yet become a widely used tag for precipitation. With the introduction of the first VHH-based research reagent GFP-Trap, GFP-fusions will become a desirable tool for pulldown. GFP-Trap is immobilized anti-GFP nanobody, which with a simple procedure, can result in quantitative depletion or isolation of GFP-fusions.



Applications of GFP-Trap may include ChIP-CHIP, CLIP, co-IP, enzyme activity analysis (see Allele Biotech’s product group main page for sample publications). Other products such as anti-RFP and anti-GFP monoclonal antibodies that may be used after GFP-fusion precipitation are now also available from Allele Biotech. “VHH fragments have great potentials in both therapeutic and basic research,” said Allele’s CEO Dr. Jiwu Wang, “The agreement will significantly strengthen Allele Biotech's position in the antibody field”. Allele Biotech started with a grant from the NIH in 2000 to develop ways to display and select antibodies. It participated in a collaborative project on yeast display for selecting antibodies against cancer antigens in 2007 for the NCI. After acquiring Orbigen in 2008, Allele has thousands of antibodies in its product line.