Development of an ELISA for the diagnosis of Corynebacterium pseudotuberculosis infections in goats.

An ELISA was developed for the diagnosis of Corynebacterium pseudotuberculosis infections in goats. A bacterial whole cell extract was used as solid-phase antigen, and serum from a culture-positive animal served as the internal reference standard. The well-to-well and assay-to-assay variations were determined to be 12.7 and 33.0%, respectively. A cut off value was determined by parallel testing of 142 sera (112 ELISA-positive, 30 ELISA-negative) in a Western blot, and the correlation between both tests was highly significant (K=0, 93). In addition, the reliability of the ELISA for the detection of infected herds was proven in a double blind study testing 910 sera from 74 goat herds.