Antibodypedia

The Antibodypedia [1] is a web service intended to provide better data on the usability of anti-protein antibodies. It's currently limited to human proteins but expansion to other species is planned (see comments). The website provides standardised results for about 3000 antibodies [2]. The antibodies were tested using Western blot, immunohistochemistry, protein array and immunofluorescence. Submissions by researchers are invited and have to pass review. Pages are not editable but scientists can comment on individual antibodies.

Creation & Funding

Initiated by Mathias Uhlén, Erik Björling, and colleagues [3] from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.

"..a pilot version of a portal called Antibodypedia (http://www.antibodypedia.org) was developed within the 6th framework EU program ProteomeBinders and launched in October 2008." [4]

"..version 2.0 of the portal was released in May 2009 and a version 3.0 was launched during the HAI workshop in September 2009 containing dynamic, user-defined web pages, advanced search functions and new scoring rules." [5]

The database was kick-started with about 4000 polyclonal antibodies generated by the Human Protein Atlas but now contains submission from researchers around the world. Funded by the 6th and 7th European Framework Programme and the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation, Sweden.

Example search

Part of the results returned by Antibodypedia when queried for insulin.

P stands for experimental data from the provider (often the company selling the antibody).

U stands for user submitted data and is colour coded: green = supportive, yellow = uncertain, red = not supportive [6].

Comment

I asked whether the AntibodypediA will be extended to common model organisms like mouse, etc. This is the reply I received via email: "We are also planning to include mouse antibodies in Antibodypedia. We will begin working towards that during 2012. Already today we have antibodies reactive to both human and mouse. To find all antibodies stated to be reactive in mouse you can use the search [7]." --- JS 10:36, 20 October 2011 (EDT)

I'm still wondering whether an open submission system may result in more user contributions.

Links

• homepage of the project
• search Antibodypedia for antibodies reactive to mouse proteins

news pieces describing the service

• "Antibodypedia – a portal for sharing antibody and antigen validation data" by Erik Björling and Mathias Uhlen [8]
• "Antibodypedia - A web portal to share antibody validation data" by Veronique Kiermer [9]