Establishment of a quantitative ELISA capable of determining peptide - MHC class I interaction

Many different assays for measuring peptide-MHC interactions have been suggested over the years. Yet, there is no generally accepted standard method available. We have recently generated preoxidized recombinant MHC class I molecules (MHC-I) which can be purified to homogeneity under denaturing conditions (i.e., in the absence of any contaminating peptides). Such denatured MHC-I molecules are functional equivalents of "empty molecules". When diluted into aqueous buffer containing beta-2 microglobulin (beta2m) and the appropriate peptide, they fold rapidly and efficiently in an entirely peptide dependent manner. Here, we exploit the availability of these molecules to generate a quantitative ELISA-based assay capable of measuring the affinity of the interaction between peptide and MHC-I. This assay is simple and sensitive, and one can easily envisage that the necessary reagents, standards and protocols could be made generally available to the scientific community.