Structures

Advantages

Disadvantages

Whole Antibody (heavy and light chains)

• Strong divalent binding to the variable regions

• High background and lower specificity than fragments

• Sufficient constant region for attachment of signal-generating dyes or enzymes.

• High Sensitivity

• For most immunoassay applications

F(ab’)2 and Fab' fragments

• Penetrate some samples better in immunohistochemistry (IHC)

• Less sensitive than whole antibody 

• Reduced nonspecific binding from Fc

• Ability to control Fc-binding to Protein A or Protein G in immunoprecipitation and Western blotting

• Simpler system for studying the structural basis for immune recognition

• Low immunogenicity for experiments in vivo