2.5. Western-blot analysis
2.6. Production of monoclonal antibody against sheep α-TTP
In order to prepare immunogens, two kinds of recombinant partial fragments of sheep α-TTP were artificially synthesized (MBL, Japan). N1 consisted of amino acid (aa) residues 1–16 and N2 consisted of a residues 266–282 (GenBank accession No: HQ268507). N1 and N2 were used as immunogens after purification via HPLC and monoclonal antibodies were produced against them according to similar procedures previously described by He et al. (2013).Briefly, the peptides were conjugated with keyhole limpet hemocyanin (KLH), emulsified in Freund's adjuvant (Sigma, USA) and the conjugates were injected intraperitoneally to 5 eight-week-old female BLAB/c mice. After completion of the immunization schedule, mice with higher titers of specific antibodies were selected and hybridomas were produced by fusion of spleen cells with SP2/0 cell line. The culture supernatants of hybridoma clones were screened by ELISA and Western-blot and the positive clones were then subcloned by limiting dilution. In the end, the monoclonal antibody produced by the final clones was purified and confirmed by different assays including ELISA, Western-blot and immunohistochemistry. It was then stored at−20 °C and expanded for further study.