NEW YORK (360Dx) – Researchers at China's National Institute of Biological Sciences (NIBS) have developed an immunofluorescence amplification technique that could significantly boost the sensitivity of some immmunoassays.

Described in a paper published this week in Nature Methods, the approach combines conventional antibody-based detection with hybridization chain reaction to amplify the fluorescent signal produced upon antibody-target binding by as much as two to three orders of magnitude.