M30 Apoptosense® ELISA(Prod. No. 10010) |
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| M30 Apoptosense® ELISA is a unique tool for reliable and reproducible quantitative detection of apoptosis of keratin 18 (K18) positive cells. The assay is intended for patient sera. Another useful application is the detection of tumor apoptosis in mouse xenograft models using plasma samples. M30 Apoptosense® is an ELISA assay based on the M30 monoclonal antibody (Leers et al., 1999). This antibody specifically binds caspase-cleaved keratin 18 (ccK18, caspase-celaved cytokeratin 18, ccCK18 or K18-Asp396) but does not bind native, uncleaved, K18. The M30 Apoptosense® assay therefore represents a specific quantitative test for apoptosis in epithelial cells (Hägg et al. 2002). All reagents are provided in a convenient ready-for-use format. The separable strips provide the flexibility for your experimental design. |
Monitoring cancer treatment
The most frequent forms of cancer in humans are the lung, breast, prostate and colon carcinomas. These tumors all arise from simple epithelial cells and express K18. During apoptosis of carcinoma cells induced by cancer therapy, K18 is cleaved and subsequently released to the extracellular environment and into the blood. In contrast, chemotherapy-induced apoptosis of other cell types such as lymphoid cells will not generate K18 cleavage products. Caspase-cleaved CK18 is therefore an ideal biomarker for monitoring apoptosis of carcinoma cells in blood. Recent studies have indeed showed increased levels of caspase-cleaved K18 (ccK18, K18Asp396-NE or M30 neo-epitope) in sera from cancer patients subjected to different treatment modalities (Kramer et al., 2004; Kramer et al., 2006). These increases are associated with clinical response to treatment (Olofsson et al., 2007, Scott et al., 2009, Hou et al., 2009).
Liver disease
Hepatocytes express K18. During different forms of liver disease that involve apoptosis, K18 is cleaved resulting in exposure of the M30-epitope in tissue (Bantel et al. 2001). Increases in soluble caspase-cleaved K18-Asp396 fragments have been demonstrated in the circulation of patients with different types of liver diseases associated with hepatocyte apoptosis, including hepatitic C virus infection (Bantel et al., 2004), hepatic B virus infection (Papatheodoridis et al., 2008), nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) (Wieckowska et al. 2006), toxicant-associated steatohepatitis (TASH) (Cave et al., 2010), bile duct inflammation and severe cholestasis (Yagmur et al., 2007).
» Brochure: M30 Apoptosense ELISA - A Serum Apoptosis Marker for Chronic Liver Disease
Other Applications
Many other diseases involve cell death by apoptosis. Measurements of caspase-cleaved K18 fragments have been shown to be useful for early prediction of survival in severe septic patients (Hofer et al., 2009).The M30 Apoptosense® ELISA has also been used to monitor transplantation patients (Luft et al., 2007) and for clinical trials of caspase-inhibitors used during liver transplantation (Baskin‑Bey et al., 2007).
