Description
Principle of the assay: This assay employs a two-site sandwich ELISA to quantitative PTN in Human serum, plasma. An antibody specific for PTN has been pre-coated onto a microplate. Standards and samples are pipetted into the wells and any PTN present is bound by the immobilized antibody. After removing any unbound substances, a biotin - conjugated antibody specific for PTN is added to the wells. After washing, Streptavidin conjugated Horseradish Peroxidase (HRP) is added to the wells. Following a wash to remove any unbound avidin-enzyme reagent, a substrate solution is added to the wells and color develops in proportion to the amount of PTN bound in the initial step. The color development is stopped and the intensity of the color is measured.
Background: Pleiotrophin was initially recognized as a neurite outgrowth-promoting factor present in rat brain around birth and as a mitogen toward fibroblasts isolated from bovine uterus tissue. Together with midkine these growth-factors constitute a family of secreted heparin-binding proteins now known as the Neurite Growth-promoting Factor (NEGF) family. During embryonic and early postnatal development, Pleiotrophin is expressed in the central and peripheral nervous system and also in several non-neural tissues, notably lung, kidney, gut and bone. Pleiotrophin is also expressed by several tumor cells and is thought to be involved in tumor angiogenesis. In the adult central nervous system. Pleiotrophin is expressed in an activity-dependent manner in the hippocampus, where it can suppress long term potentiation induction