Characterization of Rat Monoclonal Antibodies to Mouse Interferon-α and -β

Abstract

One of the features of the mouse interferon (IFN) system, in comparison with the human IFN system, is that “type I” IFNs, produced in various systems in vivo and in vitro in response to virus and other stimuli, contain both IFN- α and - β (1). Antiserum prepared using mouse type I IFN as immunogen therefore inevitably contain both antibodies to IFN- α and to IFN-β. This made it generally difficult to distinguish the α/β types of mouse IFN, and to selectively eliminate the activity of α or β IFN in various biological systems. Alleviating this situation, monoclonal antibodies to mouse IFN-β have recently been prepared (2,3), and were shown to be utilizable for one-step purification of IFN-β from crude materials containing both IFN-α and -β (4). However, monoclonal antibodies to mouse IFN-α have not been available. Here, we describe preparation of rat monoclonal antibodies to mouse IFN-α and -β, and initial characterization of their properties.