Taxonomy of methanogens by ELISA techniques.

Polyclonal antisera have been used for the development of a novel serotaxonomic system for methanogenic bacteria by quantifying immunological cross-reactions of the antisera with heterologous strains. This system corresponds well to phylogenetic relationships among methanogenic bacteria as analysed by other authors, and is in good agreement with the existing immunological fingerprint for immunotyping of methanogenic bacteria.