The Use of Complement Fixation Tests to Detect Australia Antigen‐Antibody Complexes and Antibodies to a Tween Antigen¹

Abstract

Abstract. Indications were obtained that Australia antigen‐antibody complexes are more frequent in patients with cirrhosis than in other Australia antigen‐positive individuals. The evidences were: (1) Among sera with high titres of Australia antigen, anticomplementary activity was detected at lower dilutions in 53% of the cases of cirrhosis, as compared to 14 and 7% in hepatitis patients and carriers, respectively. (2) Among anticomplementary sera which did not show Australia antigen at higher dilutions, the antigen was unmasked after heating at 85 °C in 4 of 7 cases of cirrhosis and in 2 of 11 other patients. On the other hand, a new type of antibody was demonstrated in three patients who had experienced a progressive decrease of Australia antigen titre; the antibodies were detected after the disappearance of the antigen, but they reacted only with some antigenic component of Australia‐positive sera which was unmasked after treatment with Tween 80.

Radioimmunoassay for the Detection of the Core of the Dane Particle and Antibody to It

“…Extensive studies of complement-fixing antibody to these cores demonstrated anti-core antibody in convalescent serum from a high proportion of patients with hepatitis B and provided important new information about the seroepidemiology of hepatitis B infection. The development of complement-fixing anti-HBo following hepatitis type B was also reported by Tiiiry et al [6] who used Tween 80-treated hepatitis B antigen obtained from serum as a source of complement-fixing antigen. These observations suggested that the Dane particle and its internal component may be as important as HBsAg to a full understanding of the virology and epidemiology of hepatitis B infection.…”

Antiglobulin Antibodies and Anticomplementary Factors in Hepatitis B Antigenaemia

“…T hiry et al [7] found that such anticomplementary factors can be found in over 53% of patients with cirrhosis, 14% of patients with acute hepatitis and 7% of apparently healthy subjects known to be HB antigen carriers.…”