Rabbit Polyclonal Antibody to Neurofilament NF-M
Cat# RPCA-NF-M

      Neurofilaments are the 10nm or intermediate filament proteins found specifically in neurons, and are composed predominantly of three major proteins called NF-L, NF-M and NF-H. NF-M is the neurofilament middle or medium molecular weight polypeptide and runs on SDS-PAGE gels at 145-160kDa, with some species variability, though the real molecular weight is ~105kDa. The major function of neurofilaments is likely to control the diameter of large axons (1). Antibodies to NF-M such as RPCA-NF-M are useful for identifying neuronal cells and their processes in tissue sections and in cell culture. NF-M antibodies can also be useful to visualize neurofilament rich accumulations seen in many neurological diseases, such as Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (a.k.a. Lou Gehrig’s disease) and Alzheimer’s disease (2-4).Much recent evidence has suggested that the detection of NF-L and NF-H in blood and CSF might be a useful prognostic or diagnostic biomarkers of neuronal damage and degeneration associated with a variety of CNS pathologies (5,6). The potential utility of NF-M in this fashion has not to date been examined.
      The RPCA-NF-M antibody was made against a recombinant fusion protein of E. coli TrpE fused to the C-terminus of rat NF-M, amino acids 677-845 (7). This region is very highly conserved in protein sequence across species boundaries and contains some interesting peptide repeats of currently unknown function (8). The RPCA-NF-M antibody is very similar in properties to a rabbit polyclonal the production and characterization of which were described in reference 7. As shown here, the antibody works well for western blotting, IF, ICC and IHC. Also available from EnCor is a chicken polyclonal and a widely used mouse monoclonal antibody to the same immunogen CPCA-NF-M, and MCA-3H11. All three antibodies works on a variety of species and are clean and specific on western blots, cell and tissue staining. Mouse select image at left for larger view.