Detection by Elisa Test of Antibodies to Human Papillomavirus (HPV) Type 16 E7 Oncoprotein in Patients with Benign or Malignant Papillomas from Skin or Mucosa

Abstract

HPV infections are induced by a wide range of HPV types affecting squamous stratified epithelia. The possible role of HPV types and the prevalence of antibodies to early HPV oncoproteins may be of major importance as markers for invasive cancer. However, antibody response to HPV is still poorly documented. Recently, seroepidemiologic studies have reported the incidence of antibodies against HPV 16 E4 and E7 proteins in healthy control population and in patients with cervical. cancer, using either fusion protein or synthetic peptides as antigens and a solid phase enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) or Western blot (Jochmus-Kudielka et al, 1989, 1992, Mann et al, 1990, Reeves et al, 1990, Jenison et al, 1990, 1991 Müller et al, 1990, 1992, Krchnak et al, 1990, Köchel et al, 1991, Suchankova et al, 1991, 1992, Kanda et al, 1992, Gallaway, 1992).The aim of our study was to detect and quantitate anti-HPV 16 E7 IgG in sera of patients with HPV-induced lesions using an ELISA test developed with a peptide chosen in E7 region (aa 41-aa 60), which cross reacts with HPV types 6 and 18 (Krchnak et al, 1990,) in order to determine the incidence of these antibodies in natural. infection of the normal. population and immunosuppressed patients as compared to women with genital. lesions.