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Amine biocat 3.0

SENSISpec ELISA Almond

Tree nuts are considered an important food in healthy diets. However, for part of the world’s population, they are one of the most common sources of food allergens causing acute allergic reactions that can become life-threatening. They are part of the Big Eight food groups which are responsible for more than 90% of food allergy cases in the United States, and within this group, almond allergies are persistent and normally severe and life-threatening. Almond is generally consumed raw, toasted or as an integral part of other foods. Its dietary consumption is generally associated with a reduced risk of cardiovascular diseases.

Several almond proteins have been recognized as allergens. Six of them, namely Pru du 3, Pru du 4, Pru du 5, Pru du 6, Pru du 8 and Pru du 10, have been included in the WHO-IUIS list of allergens. Nevertheless, further studies are needed in relation to the accurate characterization of the already known almond allergens or putative ones and in relation to the IgE-binding properties of these allergens to avoid misidentifications. In this context, this work aims to critically Eurofins review the almond allergy problematic and, specifically, to perform an extensive overview regarding known and novel putative almond allergens.

Food allergies are a concerning issue affecting the worldwide population, and their prevalence has been increasing for the last couple of decades.

For example, in the United States, around twenty-six million adults and six million children suffer from this condition. Although there is no cure to food allergies and food avoidance is considered the best strategy, vast research has been made in this area and potential therapies can be generally divided into two categories: allergen non-specific such as the use of monoclonal antibodies and allergen specific where the treatment is performed using recombined or native food antigens . However, less commonly, adverse side effects can range from mild to anaphylaxis or eosinophilic esophagitis and due to their unpredictable character , new and innovating therapies must be pursued.

 

PRODUCT SPECIFICATIONS

Applicable to liquids
Liquid food samples,

Applicable to solid fluid matr
Food samples (e.g. cookies, cereals, ice cream, dark chocolate)

Assay time
60′

ASSAY TYPE
QN

Attr equipment required for sample
Grinder, shaker, water bath, centrifuge, filter paper

CERT
No

Cross reactivities
Apricot kernel 100%, peach kernel 16%, mahaleb cherry kernel 1.4%,, plum kernel 1%, chia and pink pepper < 0.0003%. cherry kernel 1.7%. No cross reactivity has been observed with 32 food ingredients

Dosing range
0.4-10 ppm

Equipment required
ELISA reader, filter 450 nm

Limit of detection lod a
0.2 ppm

Limit of quantification loq
0.4 ppm

MANUFACT
EUROFINS TECHNOLOGIES

Number of determinations
48; 96

Number of standards rm for cal
5

Principle of the assay
Sandwich immunoassay

Product code
HU0030025; HU0030001

Product line
SENSISpec ELISA

Sample preparation solid
GR, EX, DI, SH, HE (60 °C, 15′), CE, (FI)

Sample prep liquid
EX, DI, SH, HE (60 °C, 15′), CE, (FI)

Sample size
1g

Shelf life
24 months

Storage
2-8 °C

Target
Almond proteins

Tech
ELISA

Test format
Microtiter plate

Validation Report Available
No

For scientific research to go further, food allergy, allergic diseases and allergens must be firstly identified and characterized. For allergens, when new ones from specific species are identified, a distinctive name is given by the WHO/IUIS Allergen Nomenclature Sub-Committee alongside the additional information about it. A vast number of allergens from more than one hundred and sixty species have been identified and most of them belong to a restricted number of protein families.

Among these, the  tryp_alpha_amyl protein family includes the higher number of known food allergens, which includes, for example, lipid transfer proteins (LTPs) and 2S albumin seed storage proteins; (2) cupin_1 protein family including the 7S vicilin seed storage proteins and the 11S legumin, and the  profilin family comprising profilins, are the most prominent ones. In almonds, several proteins of these protein families have been already identified as allergens, namely Pru du 6 (11S globulin legumin-like protein), Pru du 4 (profilin) and Pru du 3 (nonspecific LTP) and several other proteins belonging to other protein families and/or that do not have a name attributed by the Allergen Nomenclature Sub-Committee.

Great attention has already been devoted to this topic and here we intend to present a comprehensive and updated overview of almond allergens, namely the description of Pru du 10, the most recent almond allergen to be added to the WHO-IUIS list of allergens.

We also reviewed the legal framework of the European Union and the United States concerning food allergies and labelling, and the methods currently available for the detection and quantification of almond allergens in food products. All these topics combined offer a wide, updated, and comprehensive narrative about almond allergies and allergens. With that, this review aims to provide easy access to updated information about almond allergies to researchers, clinicians, and patients to be applied in their respective manners.

The research documents analyzed in this work were extracted from the PubMed and Elsevier Scopus online databases collecting academic documents, both including keywords such as ‘almond’, ‘almond allergy’ or ‘almond allergens’ or other topics considered relevant. Only publications in English were included. The articles from the search were assessed according to document type, language, and inclusion in subject category. They were further analyzed, and the results were used to write this review.

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