Hi, My name is Gloria Juan and I am part of the research group who has been "successfully" using the monoclonal antibody specific for the underphosphorylated form of the Rb protein, not only in the Leukemia paper, also in several other publications: Exp. Cell Res, 239: 104-110,1998; Exp. Cell res., 244: 83-92, 1998; Clin. Immunol. Newsletter, 18:89-94, 1998, among others. We were not aware that Pharmingen decided no to market the FITC-conjugated antibody. In fact, we are in the process of patenting together (NYMC and Pharmingen) this new approach. The antibody G99-549 is specific and you could very well use it (purified or conjugated). Of course, there is a lost of resolution but it is a matter of compromise: the use of conjugated antibodies allows us to study simultaneously many more parameters and this is a great feature of flow cytometry. Tanks and good luck, Gloria -----Original Message----- From: Kevin Waddick [mailto:waddi002@tc.umn.edu] Sent: Thursday, July 15, 1999 11:26 AM To: cyto-inbox Subject: Underphosphorylated Rb detection by FCM In a report appearing in Leukemia 12: 1241-1248, 1998, a monoclonal antibody specific to the underphosphorylated form of the retinoblastoma (Rb) protein was shown able to define by flow cytometry a population of cells in the G0/1 compartment of the cell cycle. In the Materials and Methods section, this was described as a FITC conjugate of the G99-549 MoAb clone obtained from PharMingen. Has anyone else out there used this MoAb clone (or any other MoAb) to specifically detect underphosphorylated pRb by flow cytometric analysis? I ask because when I contacted PharMingen I was informed that the FITC-conjugate of this anti-Rb MoAb was a test batch provided to the research group doing the study referenced above. PharMingen claims it was unable to duplicate the results due to a high level of nonspecific/background staining. Therefore, PharMingen decided not to market the FITC-conjugate and does not list flow cytometry in their catalog as one of the applications for this MoAb clone. However, just because PharMingen doesn't make any claims for its performance in flow cytometric analysis doesn't necessarily mean people have not successfully used it for this purpose. That is why I am asking everyone if they may have achieved decent flow cytometric results detecting underphosphorylated pRb by indirect staining using the PharMingen G99-549 MoAb clone (or by any other means). Dr. Kevin G. Waddick Hughes Institute 2657 Patton Road St. Paul, MN 55113
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Apr 03 2002 - 11:53:47 EST