[SEREX screening of human placenta antigens].

Objective: To screen and obtain the potential human placenta antigens for the further application with serological analysis of recombinant cDNA expression library (SEREX).

Methods: SEREX technique with some modifications was applied. In brief, immune sera from rabbit immunized with human chorionic tissue were used to screen human placenta tissue cDNA expression library. Positive clone plaques were obtained after two rounds of screen. And the positive clone plaques were purified and sequenced. BLAST software was applied to comparison the obtained sequences with those found in GenBank for bioinformatic analysis.

Results: 69 positive clones were obtained from two rounds of screen. They were derived from 12 different genes, 9 of these were genes of known biology function, and 3 were genes of unknown biology function depending on the sequence analysis. Among the positive clones, chorionic somatomammotropin hormone 1 and 2 genes (CSH1 and CSH2) were found in 57 of positive clones (82.6%). This implied that the CSH1 and CSH2 might be the gene of encoding the important antigen and other genes obtained were related to the development of embryo.

Conclusion: Modified xenogeneic immune SEREX technology is a very effective method to screen and isolate human placenta antigens. These antigens identified from this study might contribute to clarify the process of embryo development.