Applications of anticardiac myosin monoclonal antibodies in the diagnosis of heart disease.

We have developed anticardiac myosin antibodies, especially monoclonal antibodies, for helping in the diagnosis of heart disease. Our investigations were divided into three research projects. We visualized the distribution of myosin isozymes in human atrial and ventricular myocardium by an immunofluorescence staining method using monoclonal antibodies specific for individual human cardiac myosin isozymes. We also revealed the redistribution of these cardiac myosin isozymes in an overloaded condition. The isozymic pattern of cardiac myosin was changed from the atrial type to the ventricular type in the overloaded atrium. This isozymic redistribution can be considered as physiological adaptive mechanism to meet increased cardiac work during overload. We developed a new method of imaging for myocardial infarction by single photon emission tomography using labelled monoclonal antibody specific for cardiac myosin heavy chain. Specific localization of the labelled antibody was demonstrated in the infarcted area and no accumulation of radioactivity was shown in the bone matrix as observed in 99mTc pyrophosphate images. We developed a sensitive radioimmunoassay of cardiac myosin light chain I (LCI) and demonstrated that peak serum levels of LCI in the patients with acute myocardial infarction correlated well with the left ventricular ejection fraction. Furthermore, LCI release from the infarcted myocardium was not affected by coronary reperfusion due to intracoronary thrombolysis. Thus, serial determinations of serum LCI better quantify the extent of myocardial damage even after coronary reperfusion in acute myocardial infarction.