Significance
While performing molecular assays involving use of antibodies such as in the Western blot, immunohistochemistry, and ELISA, one should carefully choose antibodies that recognize linear or conformational epitopes.
For instance, if a protein sample is boiled, treated with beta-mercaptoethanol, and run in SDS-PAGE for the Western blot, the proteins are essentially denatured and therefore cannot assume their natural three-dimensional conformations. Therefore, antibodies that recognize linear epitopes instead of conformational epitopes are chosen for immunodetection. In contrast, in immunohistochemistry where protein structure is preserved, antibodies are preferred that recognize conformational epitopes.
Read more about this topic: Linear Epitope
Famous quotes containing the word significance:
“Politics is not an end, but a means. It is not a product, but a process. It is the art of government. Like other values it has its counterfeits. So much emphasis has been placed upon the false that the significance of the true has been obscured and politics has come to convey the meaning of crafty and cunning selfishness, instead of candid and sincere service.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
“I am not afraid that I shall exaggerate the value and significance of life, but that I shall not be up to the occasion which it is.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
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—Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre (b. 1929)