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ARS Home » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #117699
Title: CHICKEN MHC CLASS I DEFINITION USING ANTISERA INDUCED BY CLONED CLASS I SEQUENCES

Author
item FULTON, J - HY-LINE INTERNATIONAL
item Hunt, Henry
item Bacon, Larry

Submitted to: Poultry Science
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/2/2001
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: Chickens are influenced detrimentally by various diseases. However, there are strain differences in disease resistance, particularly in regards to certain types of tumors. One set of genes determining tumor resistance that varies between chickens is termed B. The B gene products can be identified by blood typing. However, antiserum specific to a class of B gene product that is on all tissues, not just red blood cells, and is most related to disease resistance, is not available. A procedure was developed to produce antiserum specific to five different forms of this widely expressed B gene product. These antisera were useful for blood-typing chickens from 31 different line/B-types, some of which are known to differ in disease resistance. These antisera, and others that could be made using this procedure, will be useful to researchers, as well as industrial breeders, for assessing the types of disease resistant B genes present in chickens.

Technical Abstract: Alloantisera directed against chicken class I Mhc (BFIV) antigens were produced using transfected cell lines expressing cloned BFIV sequences. The cloned BFIV sequences were from haplotypes *12, *13 and *21. Two laboratory derived class I mutant sequences (BFIV13M126 and BFIV21M78) were developed to analyze cross- reactive epitopes and were also used to induce specific alloanti- sera. Antisera were tested in both hemagglutination and flow cytometry assays. The antisera produced were highly specific and had minimal cross-reactivity. The antisera induced by the BFIV21 m78 mutant confirmed the significance of amino acids 78 and 81 in cross-reactivity between haplotypes B*21 and B*5. The highly specific antisera were tested by hemagglutination on RBC of 31 different Mhc haplotypes. The consistency of HA patterns and minimal cross-reactivity demonstrated that these BFIV antisera are extremely valuable in defining Mhc haplotype in various chicken lines. Because of the extreme low level of recombination between the chicken class I and class II loci, identification of BFIV allele can be used to define Mhc haplotype within a line. Complete identity between the transfected cell line and the chicken used to produce the antiserum is required to ensure the mono-specificity.