In article <3bu7jj$sbg at ixnews1.ix.netcom.com>, koslosky at ix.netcom.com
(William Koslosky) writes:
Bill, you're right about the alpha sub-unit of hCG. It is shared by other
hormones. But test specificity using antibodies to the alpha and beta as
pairs is better than using whole molecule. The capture in the assay is
usually the beta antibody, and this gives the specificity of the test. If
you use the alpha subunit as a capture, then you can capture any of the
molecules and detect with beta specific antibodies.