Biacore™ SPR Systems For Titer Analysis Of Adeno-Associated Virus

By Anna Moberg, Staff Research Engineer

Scientists mostly apply adeno-associated virus (AAV) for gene therapy, as it is an increasingly common vector for introducing nucleic acid into living cells.

Standard titer analysis uses ELISA, an assay that requires a lot of manual interaction and can come with challenges in precision and reproducibility.

In this application note, we describe the performance of two assays for titer analysis of adeno-associated virus (AAV), serotype 2 and serotype 5, based on surface plasmon resonance (SPR). Both assays provide repeatable results and correlate well with established total AAV capsid titer assays using ELISA.

We assessed:

• titer of AAV serotype 2 (AAV2) by allowing virus particles to bind to an AAV2-specific antibody covalently coupled to a Biacore™ sensor chip.
• titer of AAV serotype 5 (AAV5) by allowing virus particles to bind to an AAV5-specific antibody captured on a pre-functionalized Biacore™ sensor chip.