Stehe Stabilization of Liposomes Improves Their Use in Diagnostics

The use of liposomes in improving diagnostic assays for a broad spectrum of medical, environmental, and civil defense purposes, is demonstrated in many scientific papers as described in detail elsewhere. The main advantage of the liposome-based diagnostic assay is that it combines the lack of need to use radioactivity with increased sensitivity due to spontaneous amplification. One aspect which may offset the increase in sensitivity due to use of liposomes is a reduction in the signal-to-noise ratio. The principle of the assay is to use the fluorescent sterically stabilized immunoliposomes having the specific MAb attached to their surface as a means to detect the presence of antigen recognized by the specific MAb. One of the major factors which may reduce the sensitivity of liposome-based fluorescence immunoassay is aggregation of the liposomes which may be induced by the medium components other than the analytes.