Albumin in immunohistochemistry: Foe and friend

Michel Mittelbronn*, Klaus Dietz, Perikles Simon, Rudi Beschorner, Ariane Schleich, Thai D. Nguyen, Richard Meyermann, Holger Schlaszus

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleResearchpeer-review

3 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Immunohistochemical procedures constitute a high methodological value in both pathologic diagnostics and research. Staining quality depends on a large variety of interference factors. Primarily, background staining reduces the quality of evaluation by reducing the chromatic discrimination. For the identification of important interference factors, various incubation steps and composition of solutions recommended in routine protocols were altered or omitted in our study. Surprisingly, the most important effect concerning background staining reduction could be significantly attributed to the omission of albumin which usually is recommended as a reducer of background stainings. However, in contrast to this negative effect, albumin could also increase specific staining intensity. These findings lead to the recommendation of a careful use of albumin in immunohistochemistry because of the dichotomous effects mentioned above. Furthermore, these results imply that in case of a good specific staining pattern, the use of albumin in immunohistochemical solutions merely exerts significant negative background staining effects.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)441-444
Number of pages4
JournalApplied Immunohistochemistry and Molecular Morphology
Volume14
Issue number4
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Dec 2006
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • Albumin
  • Antibody
  • Background staining
  • Immunohistochemistry

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