THE MAJORITY OF BULLOUS PEMPHIGOID AND HERPES GESTATIONS SERUM SAMPLES READ WITH THE NC16A DOMAIN OF THE 180-KDA BULLOUS PEMPHIGOID ANTIGEN

A series of previous studies have indicated that the NC16a domain of t he 180-kDa bullous pemphigoid antigen (BP180) is the most immunogenic and probably pathogenic region in both bullous pemphigoid and herpes g estationis. To confirm these previous results by a large-scale study, me examined serum from 154 bullous pemphigoid and 43 herpes gestationi s patients using an immunoblot technique with the BP180 NC16a domain f usion protein, which had been prepared using cDNA obtained from a huma n keratinocyte cDNA library by polymerase chain reaction amplification , This fusion protein was recognized by 90% of bullous pemphigoid and 79% of herpes gestationis serum samples, but not by any other disease or normal control serum samples, These results indicate that this syst em is very sensitive and specific for the detection of anti-BP180 anti bodies and should be useful for the diagnosis of various subepidermal bullous diseases.