The Human Protein Atlas project invites submission of antibodies from both academic and commercial sources to potentially be included in the Human Protein Atlas web portal. Submitted antibodies will be validated by the standard procedures employed by the Human Protein Atlas project, including generation of high-resolution immunohistochemistry images representing a wide spectrum of normal and cancer tissues that are manually annotated. Antibodies that meet the Human Protein Atlas criteria of supportive validation may be considered to be included in the Human Protein Atlas web portal. The validation procedure and publication of antibodies may be associated with charges to cover the processing costs (see below).

Submission form

A submission may range from a single antibody to several hundreds of antibodies. Submitters are requested to fill in a submission form with information such as the Ensembl identifier of the gene/protein target, basic antibody information (host animal, pAb, mAb, etc), antigen information (target sequence is recommended), purification method, previously tested applications and dilutions, etc. Some information in the sheet is optional.

Please, only use one line in the Excel sheet per antibody. Send the submission form to: contact@proteinatlas.org.

Conditions & procedure

After submission of the form, the Human Protein Atlas will communicate if the antibodies are suitable for further validation or complete protein profiling. This information will be kept confidential by the Human Protein Atlas project. If approved, the submitter will be asked to send vials containing a minimum amount of 50µg or equivalent of each antibody delivered in appropriate tubes (preferably 1-2 ml volume with screw cap) and properly labeled. Received antibodies are tested according to the Human Protein Atlas standard quality assurance procedures, including optimization and staining on tissue microarrays including 44 different normal tissues and 20 types of cancer. The generated immunoreactivity is scored manually and validated in accordance with strict guidelines, including comparison with previous gene/RNA/protein characterization data.

Tissue profiles of successfully approved antibodies may be published on the next following release of the Human Protein Atlas web portal or as otherwise agreed. All antibodies accepted for publication on the Human Protein Atlas will also be analyzed with Western Blot using a standard set of lysates. Product number and link to the provider homepage will be displayed on the Human Protein Atlas for each published antibody. The submitter will get access to all validation data prior to publication. Academic collaborators can ask to further delay the release of the data and images (beyond six months) if a manuscript based on the results from the protein profiling is being prepared. This is normally not granted for longer than one year. Data on non-approved antibodies will only be communicated to the antibody provider and will not be published.

Cost

The processing of an antibody through the Human Protein Atlas tissue profiling setup (including protocol optimization, full tissue profiling, slide scanning, manual annotation, validation of antibody reliability, and online publication) is associated with a cost if the protein target is not of priority according to Human Protein Atlas priority criteria, i.e. depending on if the protein is already represented by at least one supportive antibody on the Human Protein Atlas web portal, or if a supportive antibody is already in the pipeline. Antibodies against proteins not yet characterized by the Human Protein Atlas will be accepted free of charge.

Protein profiling of academic submissions may be subsidized or handled free of charge depending on the nature of a potential scientific collaboration.

For further details on the cost, please send an email to: contact@proteinatlas.org.

Disclaimer

• Each submitted antibody is checked for priority and only submissions approved by the Human Protein Atlas will be validated.
• The decision whether or not to publish a validated antibody ultimately and solely lies with the Human Protein Atlas project.
• Maximum two antibodies per submitter may be published on the web portal per gene, but there is no maximum number of antibodies per gene that can be fully validated.
• Published antibodies may be retracted in future versions due to new or contradictive gene/RNA/protein characterization data or Ensembl updates.