Their research, published today in mSphere, details the development and validation of their monoclonal antibody (mAb)-based blocking enzyme-linked immunoassay (bELISA) test, which the study authors say is a useful tool for identifying potential new animal reservoirs to prevent future coronavirus outbreaks.

Most antibody tests are designed for humans and rely on special species-specific chemical reagents, most of which aren’t commercially available, impeding pan-species research.

“The N-protein is more abundant and it is more conserved than the proteins used in most tests,” lead author Ying Fang, PhD, said in a University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign news release.

But this one detects antibodies against the virus’s N-protein, which is consistent across species, making it a better target than the membrane-bound viral proteins usually used in these tests.

In addition to humans, SARS-CoV-2 has been known to infect cats, dogs, deer, mink, lions, snow leopards, and tigers.

“These findings cause great concerns on the potential for human to animal and animal to human transmission, along with the appearance of viral mutations as the virus spillover between species,” the authors wrote.

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