There are a wide variety of approaches available; therefore researchers are encouraged to make a consultation appointment with the Core Director at 617-632-2209. For the consultation appointment, please have the sequence of your protein available, the species from which is it derived and a good idea of how you will use the antibodies in your experiments i.e. Western blot analysis, IHC, IF, flow cytometry, or ELISA detection.
The host selected for your immunization will be dependent on the type of protein (intracellular vs. extracellular) and the species from which the protein is derived.
Yes. You need to tell us at the consultation that you will be screening the antibodies. It will be very important to coordinate the timing of the screening to prevent overgrowth of the cells.
The generation of mAbs is a long and multi-step procedure. The Core will send e-mail notification once a distinct step is completed and requires your permission to proceed to the next one (for example, once the animal shows an immune response in the sera screen and is ready for fusion). Information on any project can be obtained at any time by contacting the Core Director.
We request information about your financial coordinator (on the Service Request form), billing address, etc. and if you or your PI works at the DFCI, we can directly bill your project numbers. If you or your PI is a member of the DF/Harvard Cancer Center, we require a PO from your financial coordinator for billing purposes. For outside researchers, we also require a PO and the appropriate billing information.
Every antibody development project has its risks; one of them is that we cannot guarantee that your protein will be immunogenic. We have quality control measures in place that will help increase the chances of success but there are always proteins that fail to produce an antibody.
Since we have a multi-step process in place, you will pay only for work that has been completed.