Figure 7.

Protective effect of saccharides on bound primary antibodies. Serial tonsil sections were labelled with a FITC-conjugated anti-human IgM primary antibody and immunostained with an anti-FITC (top left) or anti-rabbit (top mid-left) secondary antibody. Air-drying in TBS after the primary antibody markedly reduced the rabbit antibody antigenicity for the anti-rabbit secondary (top right), less so for the anti-FITC antibody (top mid-right), whereas most of the antibody was still bound after rehydration. The presence of 5% lactose (bottom left) or 5% sucrose (bottom mid-left) in the buffer before drying improved the preservation of the FITC epitope, less so of the protein epitope (bottom mid-right). Air drying with or without sugars allowed 2-ME/SDS removal of the bound primary antibody (bottom right). Asterisk (*) refers to sections that were stripped before applying the anti-FITC AP-conjugated antibody. Original magnification 4×; Scale, 50 µm. No nuclear counterstain.