DIAGNOSTICUM FOR IDENTIFICATION OF LEGIONELLES IN CLINICAL MATERIAL AND AMBIENT OBJECTS AND METHOD FOR PREPARATION THEREOF Russian patent published in 1999 - IPC

FIELD: microbiology. SUBSTANCE: invention is designed for epidemiological environmental objects' monitoring and for laboratory diagnostics of legionellesis. Diagnosticum contains a sensitin and, additionally, a carrier. The carrier is anthraquinone blue-colored polystyrene latex with activated amino groups characterizing by particle size 0.804 mcm, coefficient of variation 4.1-4.5%, coefficient of dispersion 1.003- 1.006, and amino group content 2.5*10⁴ to 2.5*10⁵ mole/g. The sensitin is rabbit immunoglobulin specific for group-specific surface protein antigen Legionella pneumophila with molecular weight 45 kD. Preparation of diagnosticum: 1% suspension of preliminarily washed particles of above-mentioned polystyrene latex is incubated with specific rabbit immunoglobulin using dilution titer 1: 128, volume ratio of the two components being 1:1. After incubation followed by washing, precipitated particle of latex covalently bound to specific rabbit immunoglobulin are further incubated with glycine buffer, pH 8.2. Mixture is then once more washed to give diagnosticum in the form of 0.5% suspension of sensitin-bound latex particles. EFFECT: increased specificity and sensitivity. 2 tbl