Rat IgM Isotype Control, Invitrogen™

Description

• The isotype of a primary antibody and the application it is being used in can result in background staining
• Primary antibody background noise can be caused by binding to Fc receptors on target cells; by non-specific interactions with cellular proteins, carbohydrates, and lipids; or by cell autofluorescence
• Isotype control antibodies can act as negative controls to help differentiate non-specific background signal from specific antibody signal because they have no relevant specificity to a target antigen
• While isotype controls are most commonly used in flow cytometry, they are useful in other applications such as chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP), immunohistochemistry, and gel shifts
• Isotype controls should match with the primary antibody species and isotype so that the level of specific staining by the primary antibody may be accurately determined
• If using directly labeled primary antibodies, the isotype control works best if conjugated with the same label as the test antibody.