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Antibody characterization is critical to enhance reproducibility in biomedical research

Kahn, Richard A, Virk, Harvinder, Laflamme, Carl, Houston, Douglas W, Polinski, Nicole K, Meijers, Rob, Levey, Allan I, Saper, Clifford B +10 more·2024·eLife
DOI 10.7554/elife.100211PMC PMC11324233
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Abstract

Antibodies are used in many areas of biomedical and clinical research, but many of these antibodies have not been adequately characterized, which casts doubt on the results reported in many scientific papers. This problem is compounded by a lack of suitable control experiments in many studies. In this article we review the history of the ‘antibody characterization crisis’, and we document efforts and initiatives to address the problem, notably for antibodies that target human proteins. We also present recommendations for a range of stakeholders – researchers, universities, journals, antibody vendors and repositories, scientific societies and funders – to increase the reproducibility of studies that rely on antibodies.

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Authors
Kahn, R. A., Virk, H., Laflamme, C., Houston, D. W., Polinski, N. K., Meijers, R., Levey, A. I., Saper, C. B., Errington, T. M., Turn, R. E., Bandrowski, A., Trimmer, J. S., Rego, M., Freedman, L. P., Ferrara, F., Bradbury, A. R., Cable, H., & Longworth, S.
Affiliations
  • Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine
  • Department of Respiratory Sciences, University of Leicester
  • Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, Structural Genomics Consortium, The Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University
  • The Development Studies Hybridoma Databank, University of Iowa
  • The Michael J Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research
  • Institute for Protein Innovation
  • Department of Neurology, Emory University School of Medicine
  • Department of Neurology and Program in Neuroscience, Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center
  • Center for Open Science
  • Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Stanford University School of Medicine
  • Department of Neuroscience, University of California, San Diego
  • Department of Physiology and Membrane Biology, University of California, Davis School of Medicine
  • Addgene
  • Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research
  • Specifica, a Q2 company
  • Department of Research and Development, Abcam
  • CiteAb
ORCID
Venue
eLife
Publisher
eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd
Published
2024-08-14
Volume
13
ISSN
2050-084X
DOI
10.7554/elife.100211
PMC
PMC11324233
Cited by
40
References
9
Language
en
Licence
Funders
  • National Institute of General Medical Sciences (1R35GM122568)
  • Genome Canada, Genome Quebec and Ontario Genomics (OGI-210)
  • National Institutes of Health (U54AG065187, U24NS109113, U24NS119916)

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