Design and Synthesis of Compound-specific Haptens for Organophosphorus Insecticides
The key step to developing an immunoassay for small molecular compounds is to synthesize artificial antigens with good immunogenicity. Creative Biolabs can assist you in hapten design and chemical synthesis of target analytes such as antibiotics, toxins, pesticides. Generally, these low molecular weight compounds are non-immunogenic. However, Creative Biolabs' advanced biochemical synthesis technology can design and modify haptens (such as the selection of modification sites, the preparation of hapten derivatives, and the selection of spacers) to promote the development of small molecule antibodies.
Overview of Organophosphorus (OPs) Insecticides
OPs compounds are widely used in the agriculture industry around the world as pesticides and insecticides. However, they are considered hazardous substances because of their high toxicity to nontarget species and their persistence in the environment and agricultural products. Therefore, it is important to develop a rapid, sensitive, and economical method for detecting OPs insecticides and their residues in food and the environment. The conventional methods, such as gas chromatography and high-performance liquid chromatography, are the most commonly used techniques for detecting OPs insecticides in different samples. However, these methods require expensive equipment and are time-consuming in laboratory settings. In contrast, immunoassays are an alternative and promising method because of their many advantages. It is a fast, easy-to-execute, sensitive, and cost-effective tool for detecting trace amounts of chemicals such as OPs insecticides. Immunoassay methods involve the use of antibodies, which are a key component of all immunoassays. Since OPs insecticides are small molecules, they cannot trigger an immune response to produce antibodies. To solve this problem, its derivative, haptens, can be synthesized and conjugated with carrier proteins to induce antibody production.
Compound-specific Haptens Design and Synthesis Services
There are 24 kinds of OPs compounds (18 kinds of O, O-dimethyl OPs, and 6 kinds of O, O-diethyl OPs) used in immunoassays. Their structure is shown in Fig.1. Based on the structural characteristics of different OPs compounds, Creative Biolabs offers a series of compound-specific haptens using the chemical synthetic method and coupling them to carrier protein for use as immunogens. All of our haptens carry a benzene ring with a carboxyl group (carboxyl is used to couple hapten with carrier protein), and the difference between these haptens is the common structure of the OPs (O, O-diethyl or O, O-dimethyl phosphorothioate), the position of the carboxyl group on the benzene ring, other substituents and their positions on the benzene ring. The hapten is then conjugated to a carrier (such as bovine serum albumin) through N-hydroxysuccinimide active esters to produce an immunogen, which can generate antibodies against OPs.
Fig.1 Chemical structures of OPs. (Zhao, 2016)
Service Process:
Creative Biolabs' proven expertise will guide you through the generation of highly immunogenic hapten-protein conjugates for antibody development purposes. Our chemistry method can be used to couple haptens containing reactive functional groups to carrier proteins such as BSA, KLH or OVA. If the analyte of your choice does not contain any reactive functional groups, our staff can synthesize analyte analogs containing reactive groups suitable for coupling purposes. If you are interested in our services, please feel free to contact us.
Reference
- Zhao, F.; et al. Development and comparative study of chemosynthesized antigen and mimotope-based immunoassays for class-specific analysis of O, O-dimethyl organophosphorus pesticides. Scientific Reports. 2016, 6:37640.