Immunoferritin Studies on Naturally Occurring Antibodies in Mouse Sera Against the Mouse Mammary Tumor Virus (MMTV)

Abstract

Few immunoelectron microscopic studies have been carried out in which sera of mice bearing mammary tumors were tested for the presence of naturally occurring antibodies to MMTV. In one study it was reported that sera of mice with spontaneous mammary tumors did not contain antibodies to MMTV tested by the direct immunoferritin method. It was recently reported that sera of mice bearing spontaneous mammary tumors and at least some tumor- free mice possess antibodies to MMTV which can be demonstrated by the indirect immunoperoxidase procedure. The present study was undertaken to determine (i) if naturally occurring serum antibodies to MMTV could be detected using the indirect immunoferritin method, (ii) the distribution of such antibodies in various strains of inbred mice and(iii) the degree to which immunoferritin results correlate with results derived from the same sera tested by fixed immunofluorescence.