Gel electrophoresis-derived enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay of serum from cows resistant to and cows susceptible to challenge exposure with Mycoplasma bovis.

The gel electrophoresis-derived enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (GED-ELISA) technique combines the high resolving power of sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) to separate complex molecules by their molecular weights, with the high sensitivity of the ELISA to detect specific antibody, Sera from 4 cows that demonstrated resistance to challenge exposure and 4 cows that were susceptible to challenge exposure with live virulent Mycoplasma bovis strain 201 were subjected to GED-ELISA to determine reactivity with M bovis antigenic components separated by SDS-PAGE. The GED-ELISA mean reactivity of sera from the 2 groups did not differ significantly (P = 0.17) when subjected to analysis of variance. Sera from both groups recognized distinct fractions of M bovis.