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Nadine Mothes, Rudolf Valenta, Susanne Spitzauer
Allergy testing: the role of recombinant allergens
Keywords: component-resolved diagnosis (CRD), cross-sensitization, hypoallergenic derivatives, microarrayed allergens, recombinant allergens, specific immunotherapy, type I allergy
Currently, diagnosis of type I allergy is performed using crude allergen extracts, which allow the identification of the allergen-containing source responsible for type I allergic symptoms (e.g., allergic rhino-conjunctivitis, asthma) but not the disease-eliciting molecules. With the introduction of recombinant allergens produced by molecular biology techniques, a large panel of allergenic molecules has become available. The application of these recombinant allergens for in vitro tests has led to new forms of component-resolved diagnosis (CRD) and allows the establishment of a patient's individual reactivity profile. The increasing number of recombinant allergens characterized during the last decade has allowed the development of chip-based allergy tests for simultaneous detection of up to 5000 different allergens and epitopes. The introduction of these recombinant allergen-based tests into clinical practice improves the selection of patients for traditional specific immunotherapy and allows monitoring of the immunological efficacy of specific immunotherapy by measuring allergen-specific IgG antibodies. Besides their diagnostic application, recombinant allergens and hypoallergenic derivatives thereof have also been used as vaccines in clinical trials, and recent results have shown their usefulness for the treatment of type I allergy.
Clinical Chemical Laboratory Medicine, Walter de Gruyter
Print ISSN: 1434-6621
Volume: 44, 02/2006
Pages: 125 - 132