Printed slides were prepared for staining by treating with 1xReBlot (Millipore, Billerica, MA) for 15 min, followed by 2 × 5 min washes with PBS. Slides were treated for 1 h with blocking solution (1 g of I-block (Applied Biosystems, Bedford, MA), 0.5% Tween-20 in 500 mL of PBS) with constant rocking at room temperature. Each slide was incubated with a single primary antibody at room temperature for 30 min.
Each array was probed with a single polyclonal or monoclonal primary antibody.
Primary antibodies used to investigate 25 endpoints for RPPA are listed in Table
The negative control slide was incubated with antibody diluent. Secondary antibody was goat anti-rabbit IgG heavy + chain (1:10,000) (Vector Laboratories, Burlingame, CA). Subsequent protein detection was amplified via horseradish peroxidase-mediated biotinyltyramide with chromogenic detection (diaminobenzidine) according to the manufacturer's instructions (Dako).
Total amount per microarray spot was normalized on total DNA level as previously described (Chiechi et al., 2012 (link), 2013 (link)), and confirmed on total protein and housekeeping protein beta-actin. Total protein staining was performed using Sypro Ruby Protein blot stain (Invitrogen) according to the manufacturer's instructions and scanned with a NovaRay CCD imager (Alpha Innotech, San Leonardo, CA, USA) equipped with a Cy3 filter.
The stability of three normalization analytes (ssDNA, total protein and β-actin) and three protein analytes (Akt Ser473, Akt Thr308, ERK Thr202/Tyr204) was evaluated by geNorm and NormFinder as previously reported (Chiechi et al., 2012 (link)).
Arrays were scanned, spot intensity analyzed with commercial software Image Quant v.5.0, data normalized, and a standardized, single data value was generated for each sample on the array. Additional quality control measures for antibody staining included evaluation of reference lysate staining by visual inspection of scanned images and examination of data analysis results for the positive and negative reference lysates.