An automated particle-counting immunoassay (PACIA) for serum IgE

Total IgE was determined in 107 sera using a novel, automated, non-isotopic immunoassay called PACIA (particle-counting immunoassay) based on agglutination of anti-IgE coated latex particles by IgE. The IgE values ranged from 10 to 50,000 iu/ml and were compared with results obtained by a conventional radioimmunoassay (RIA) which used a fast double antibody separation technique--the coefficient of correlation was 0.985 and the regression line y = 0.82 x +130.00. PACIA had several advantages over the RIA technique: using a sampling rate of 50/hr, results were obtained in 35 min compared to 16-20 hr, no labelled IgE was required and the separation step, which relied on measuring the number of non-agglutinated particles by an optical cell counter, was fully automated. The threshold of sensitivity was 10 iu/ml and the maximal coefficient of variation for between assay precision was 12.9%.