Outer membrane protein serosubtyping of Neisseria meningitidis

A system for typing Neisseria meningitidis has been developed which uses monoclonal antibodies against two separate classes of outer membrane proteins (class 1 and class 2/3) in addition to capsular polysaccharide serogrouping. It was shown that class 1 outer membrane protein subtypes are common to meningococcal reference strains of different serotypes. Application of the system to 50 group B meningococcal patient isolates revealed that 75% could be categorized as class 1 subtypes. The typing system has potential usefulness in epidemiological surveillance and vaccine development.