A sandwich ELISA for the detection of bluetongue virus in cell culture using antiserum against the recombinant VP7 protein.

A polyclonal antibody-based sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (s-ELISA) was developed for the detection of bluetongue virus (BTV). The test used antiserum against BTV and antiserum against the bluetongue (BT) core protein. The antiserum against the virus was used as a capture antibody and the antiserum against the protein was used for detection. In this study, antiserum to recombinant viral protein 7 (rVP7) was used as a detection antibody in place of anti-core antiserum. The assay was used to detect the BT serotypes found in India, namely: 1, 2, 9, 15, 18 and 23. The modified sandwich assay was able to detect BTV serotypes in cell culture supernatants. The use of anti-rVP7 antiserum as the detection antibody avoids the tedious and expensive purification of BTV core particles.