Counterimmunoelectrophoretic Detection of a High Incidence of Precipitin Reactions in Normal Human Sera Against Staphylococcal Teichoic Acids and Protein A

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Abstract
The use of counterimmunoelectrophoresis (CIE) for detection of serum antibodies to staphylococcal teichoic acids was evaluated against teichoic acids prepared by sonic treatment or lysostaphin extraction Staphylococcus aureus (Lafferty strain). Of 54 patient sera from suspected cases of staphylococcal endocarditis, osteomyelitis or septicemia, 33 (61.1%) were positive by CIE analysis; 128 of 291 sera (44.0%) from normal adult donors were also positive. Selected CIE-positive sera from patient and control groups were titered by Ouchterlony gel diffusion. In the control group of normal sera, 65% were also positive by gel diffusion, but only 15% had titers of .gtoreq. 1:2. Of the patient sera, 44.4% had gel diffusion titers of .gtoreq. 1:2. In addition to the specific teichoic acid band, a 2nd precipitation band could be demonstrated with patient or normal sera by CIE or gel diffusion. This 2nd precipitin band involved interactions of test sera with staphylococcal protein A present in the teichoic acid extracts. The protein A precipitins were detected at high concentrations of the antigen extracts, whereas the anti-teichoic acid precipitins were optimally detected at lower antigen concentrations. The formation of protein A precipitin bands did not correlate with the presence of anti-teichoic acid antibodies, as most sera tested were positive for protein A regardless of anti-teichoic acid activity. A high incidence of nromal people may have levels of antibodies to teichoic acids which are detectable by the highly sensitive, but nonspecific, technique of CIE.