“The term immunogenicity refers to the ability of a substance to induce cellular and humoral immune response, while antigenicity is the ability to be specifically recognized by the antibodies generated because of the immune response to the given substance. While all immunogenic substances are antigenic, not all antigenic substances are immunogenic.” [1]

Allergies have a high social impact, 4% to 8% of children are diagnosed as allergic and a significant portion of these present symptoms that prevent school attendance, which in turn, takes at least one of their caregivers away from work [2-4]. In addition to absence at work, altering meal-preparation routine and other family social activities negatively impacts stress levels [5]. Thus, adequate diagnosis is fundamental.

The best-known measure to prevent food allergy symptomatology is the adoption of exclusion diets and to ensure clearer food labeling many countries have food allergen labeling laws. For example, the Food Allergen Labeling and Consumer Protection Act (FALCPA/USA-2004) requires that foods are labeled to identify the eight major food allergens: milk, egg, fish, crustacean-shellfish, tree nuts, wheat, peanuts and soybeans which account for over 90% of all documented food allergies in the U.S. [6] A Along with these 8 the Australian law requires the labeling of two other foods – sesame and lupin [3]. In the European Union 14 foods are on the required labeling list: the ten previously cited plus celery, mustard, Sulphur dioxide, and mollusks. [4]

Regardless of whether ingested food is derived from animals or plants, the food matrix is composed of varying amounts of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. To perform reliable analysis of each macronutrient, several techniques have been developed to obtain adequate quantities of purified material with a minimum of structural and functional loss. For this, the main steps are: extraction, quantification, biological function determination, sequence and structure identification [7]. Among the resources used in food protein analysis, the first step is the physical fragmentation of solid foods. This increases the contact surface of the food with the buffers during incubation, permitting a more efficient extraction [8]. Acidic, neutral, or alkaline molecules are preferentially extracted when specific buffers with different salts and ionic strengths are employed. The efficiency of these buffers may vary according to the food matrix, thus altering the protein yield resulting from the extraction process [9]. Once a protein extract is obtained, quantification is a fundamental procedure influencing the registered protein content of foods. The three most frequently used indirect methods are based on Lowry, Bradford and Kjeldahl techniques [10] [11]. The main objective of this study was to document the protein immunogenicity and sensitivity in immunoassays, as the result of different extraction buffers, of a seed considered to be extremely immunogenic.