IgG, IgM and IgA antibody responses against immediate-early, early and late human cytomegalovirus proteins in patients with HCMV infections

The IgG, IgM and IgA antibody responses against the immediate-early, early and late proteins of human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) strain AD169 in sera from HCMV-seropositive subjects and from patients with primary and secondary HCMV infections were studied by immunoblotting. Antibodies against 16 HCMV proteins with molecular masses of 150, 145, 140, 130, 100, 92, 85, 72, 65, 62, 55, 52, 45, 39, 32 and 28 kDa were identified. The antibodies significantly associated with HCMV infection were directed against the 92 and 72 kDa immediate-early gene products, the 130, 62 and 45 kDa early gene products and the 150, 65, 52, 39 and 32 kDa late gene products. Our results also showed that the detection of IgA antibodies against HCMV proteins was as sensitive but less specific than the detection of IgM for the diagnosis of HCMV infections.