The incidence of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), which includes Chron’s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC), is increasing globally, as is the healthcare burden, with studies showing it as one of the top 5 most expensive GI conditions. Early and accurate diagnosis is strongly associated with better patient outcomes. However, the common procedures for diagnosis are invasive and there is still a delay in determination of disease extent and activity. While the exact cause of IBD is unknown, the interaction of microbes with the gut mucosa may play a pivotal role in initiation and progression.
Researchers at the Biodesign Institute of Arizona State University have developed novel antimicrobial antibody signatures for diagnosing IBD (both CD and UC) as well as understanding the association of microbial infection with IBD pathogenesis. These antimicrobial antibody signatures were developed after studying the IgG and IgA antimicrobial antibody profile of 100 CD and 100 UC patents as well as 100 age-gender matched healthy controls against 1570 microbial antigens using a protein microarray platform. They discovered 13 IgG antibodies with elevated prevalence in CD patients (sensitivity ≥ 14% at 96% specificity), and 4 antimicrobial IgG antibodies with elevated prevalence in UC patients relative to healthy controls. Additionally, they identified 46 IgG and 22 IgA validated anti-microbial antibodies with higher prevalence in CD patients compared to UC patients while 28 IgG and 9 IgA validated anti-microbial antibodies with higher prevalence in UC patients compared to CD patients. Using these findings, they built multi-antibody panels that could distinguish CD vs control, UC vs control and CD vs UC with an area under the curve of 0.81, 0.87 and 0.82, respectively.
These antibody panels may help aid in the accurate and early-stage diagnosis of IBD as well as distinguish between CD vs control, UC vs control and CD vs UC.
Potential Applications
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Multi-antibody panels for IBD
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Distinguish CD vs control
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Distinguish UC vs control
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Distinguish CD vs UC
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Could be used to develop novel strategies for the prevention of IBD
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Looking at the source microorganisms of the target antigens
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Benefits and Advantages
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Distinguish CD vs control with AUC of 0.81, UC vs control with AUC of 0.87 and CD vs UC with an AUC of 0.82
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Observed a stronger anti-microbial antibody response with more aggressive disease in both CD and UC patients
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Demonstrated that antimicrobial antibodies and autoantibodies had different reactivity patterns in CD patients
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Provides interest insight into the pathogenesis of IBD
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Unbiased, data-driven approach
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Broadest analysis to date of IgG and IgA antibodies against individual antigens from many different microorganisms in both CD and UC patients
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