Development of an improved competitive ELISA based on a monoclonal antibody against lipopolysaccharide for the detection of bovine brucellosis

BACKGROUND: Brucellosis is the most common bacterial zoonosis, and serological tests are routinely used in brucellosis control and eradication programs. In order to improve the accuracy of serological diagnostic method used in bovine brucellosis detection, this study developed an improved competitive ELISA with higher specificity and good sensitivity. RESULTS: This study prepared 12 monoclonal antibodies against smooth Brucella lipopolysaccharide. One monoclonal antibody 3 F9, presented C epitope specificity, was used to develop a competitive ELISA for the serological detection of bovine brucellosis. The competitive ELISA, a commercial competitive ELISA kit, the rose-bengal plate agglutination test, and a microplate agglutination test were all used in the detection of 6 hyperimmune antisera against other commonly cross-reacted bacterial pathogens and 110 clinical bovine serum samples. The results of the test comparisons indicated that the competitive ELISA had higher specificity than the commercial competitive ELISA kit and RBT, and comparable sensitivity with the commercial ELISA kit. CONCLUSIONS: This study provided a valuable detection tool with high specificity and good sensitivity, which prevent the wrong-culling of bovines in the eradication campaigns of bovine brucellosis. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12917-015-0436-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.