Exploring beyond clinical routine SARS-CoV-2 serology using MultiCoV-Ab to evaluate endemic coronavirus cross-reactivity
Matthias Becker, Monika Strengert, Daniel Junker, Philipp D. Kaiser, Tobias Kerrinnes, Bjoern Traenkle, Heiko Dinter, Julia Häring, Stéphane Ghozzi, Anne Zeck, Frank Weise, Andreas Peter, Sebastian Hörber, Simon Fink, Felix Ruoff, Alex Dulovic, Tamam Bakchoul, Armin Baillot, Stefan Lohse, Markus Cornberg, Thomas Illig, Jens Gottlieb, Sigrun Smola, André Karch, Klaus Berger, Hans-Georg Rammensee, Katja Schenke‐Layland, Annika Nelde, Melanie Märklin, Jonas S. Heitmann, Juliane S. Walz, Markus F. Templin, Thomas Joos, Ulrich Rothbauer, Gérard Krause, Nicole Schneiderhan‐Marra
Abstract
The humoral immune response to SARS-CoV-2 is a benchmark for immunity and detailed analysis is required to understand the manifestation and progression of COVID-19, monitor seroconversion within the general population, and support vaccine development. The majority of currently available commercial serological assays only quantify the SARS-CoV-2 antibody response against individual antigens, limiting our understanding of the immune response. To overcome this, we have developed a multiplex immunoassay (MultiCoV-Ab) including spike and nucleocapsid proteins of SARS-CoV-2 and the endemic human coronaviruses. Compared to three broadly used commercial in vitro diagnostic tests, our MultiCoV-Ab achieves a higher sensitivity and specificity when analyzing a well-characterized sample set of SARS-CoV-2 infected and uninfected individuals. We find a high response against endemic coronaviruses in our sample set, but no consistent cross-reactive IgG response patterns against SARS-CoV-2. Here we show a robust, high-content-enabled, antigen-saving multiplex assay suited to both monitoring vaccination studies and facilitating epidemiologic screenings for humoral immunity towards pandemic and endemic coronaviruses.