Celiac disease is an enteropathy that is characterized by intestinal lesions of variable severity. Tissue-type transglutaminase (tTG) is believed to be the predominant autoantigen for celiac disease and the corresponding autoantibodies show higher sensitivity and specificity than anti-gliadin antibodies. Highly pure recombinant human tTG is now available to replace the traditionally used tTG fraction from guinea pig.
Tissue-type transglutaminase antigens have been specifically modified for improved handling: exchange of an active site amino acid eliminates the protein cross-linking activity of the enzyme, while maintaining the native three-dimensional structure and the enzyme's secondary GTPase activity. This engineering assures reproducible properties of the antigen preparations through the absence of variable and ill-defined covalent aggregates of tTG antigen and host cell proteins.
Tissue Transglutaminase Human Recombinant produced in E.coli is a non-glycosylated, polypeptide chain having a molecular mass of 78,018 Dalton. tTG is expressed with a -6xHis tag and purified by proprietary chromatographic techniques. By point mutation of the active center the catalytic transglutaminase activity has been eliminated, resulting in increased stability during storage and coating.