The antibody horror show: an introductory guide for the perplexed

• Published in: New biotechnology Vol. 45; pp. 9 - 13
• Main Author: Goodman, Simon. L.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 25-10-2018; Elsevier Science Ltd
• Subjects: Accessibility; Antibodies; Biology; Commercial antibodies; Communities; Community reporting; Immunoglobulins; Reagents; Reproducibility; User-Training; Validation; Validation studies; Validation; Community reporting; User-Training; Reproducibility; Commercial antibodies
• ISSN: 1871-6784; 1876-4347
• DOI: 10.1016/j.nbt.2018.01.006

•Commercial antibodies are vital to biological research but still trouble users.•Unique identifiability of antibody and supplier, and batch validation are crucial.•Users must confirm specificity and activity as fit for each experimental purpose.•Full training of young biologists in the use and misuse of antibodies is crucial.•Routine community reporting of antibody activity/inactivity would be invaluable.
The biological literature reverberates with the inadequacies of commercial research-tool antibodies. The scientific community spends some $2 billion per year on such reagents. Excellent accessible scientific platforms exist for reliably making, validating and using antibodies, yet the laboratory end-user reality is somehow depressing – because they often “don’t work”. This experience is due to a bizarre and variegated spectrum of causes including: inadequately identified antibodies; inappropriate user and supplier validation; poor user training; and overloaded publishers. Colourful as this may appear, the outcomes for the community are uniformly grim, including badly damaged scientific careers, wasted public funding, and contaminated literature. As antibodies are amongst the most important of everyday reagents in cell biology and biochemistry, I have tried here to gently suggest a few possible solutions, including: a move towards using recombinant antibodies; obligatory unique identification of antibodies, their immunogens, and their producers; centralized international banking of standard antibodies and their ligands; routine, accessible open-source documentation of user experience with antibodies; and antibody-user certification.