Unilever Patent Holdings B.v.

Inverness Medical Switzerland Gmbh

Unipath Limited

Radiometer Corporate Development Ltd.

Robert Andrew Badley

Philip Porter

Mark J Berry

Robert Andrew Porter

Thomas J Sands

Anthony Hugh Carr

Trevor Wattam

Trevor A Wattam

Ian Jobling

Disclosed is a component for a device for detecting the presence of an analyte of interest in a sample, the component comprising an electrically conducting solid support having immobilized thereon a chemical moiety, said chemical moiety comprising an electroactive portion with an electrochemical property capable of being directly modulated in a detectable manner by the binding thereto of a binding partner having a specific binding activity for the electroactive portion, together with apparatus comprising the component, and a method of detecting the presence of an analyte of interest.

Electrochemical assays

Specific binding assays

An antibody specific for a target analyte is purified by affinity chromatography on a substrate bearing a low-affinity analogue of the target analyte. The antibody is displaced from the substrate by contact with a second analogue of intermediate affinity, which remains complexed with the antibody. This complex can be used in a conventional assay for the target analyte, which displaces the intermediate-affinity analogue. The complexed antibody is rendered more storage-stable because the second analogue protects the antibody binding reagion.

Recovery of and uses of specific binding agents

A test for microbial growth is carried out by culturing a microorgnism to be tested in a lliquid culture medium containing an enzymatically hydrolyzable fluorogenic substrate for a period of less than about 7 hours, measuring fluorescence of the culture medium resulting from hydrolysis of the fluorogenic substrate by growth of the microorganism, continuing culturing of the microorganism in the culture medium for an additional period, and measuring microorganism growth by a non-fluorescent method as a confirmatory test of growth determined from fluorescence. Preferably, the additional culture period is overnight and the non-fluorescent method is by visual inspection. The culture medium may be in the wall of a microtitre plate, and the culture medium can contain an antibiotic to test for sensitivity of a microorganism to the antibiotic or to test for minimum inhibitory concentration of the antibiotic.

Microorganism testing with a hydrolyzable fluorogenic substrate

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Bedford, United Kingdom

Robert Andrew Badley