Frontotemporal lobar degeneration (
FTLD) is one of the leading causes of
dementia after
Alzheimer's disease. A high-ranking candidate to become a diagnostic marker for a major pathological subtype of
FTLD is the transactive response
DNA binding protein of 43 kDa (TDP-43). The main objective is to elucidate which
antibodies are specific for pathological TDP-43, with special interest in its modified
isoforms. Indeed, TDP-43 has been shown to be hyperphosphorylated and truncated in disease. A secondary objective is to review existing immunoassays that quantify TDP-43 in biofluids. A systematic review of literature was performed by searching PubMed and Web of Science using predefined keywords. Of considered research papers the methods section was reviewed to select publications that enabled us to answer our learning objective. After quality assessment, antibody characteristics and related outcomes were extracted. We identified a series of well-characterized
antibodies based on a scoring system that assessed the ability of each antibody to detect TDP-43 pathology. A selection of 29 unique
antibodies was made comprising 10 high-ranking
antibodies which were reported multiple times to detect TDP-43 pathology in both immunostaining and immunoblotting experiments and 19 additional
antibodies which detected TDP-43 pathology but were only scored once. This systematic review provides an overview of
antibodies that are reported to detect pathological TDP-43. These
antibodies can be used in future studies of
TDP-43 proteinopathies. Additionally, selected
antibodies hold the potential to be used in the development of novel immunoassays for the quantification of TDP-43 in biofluids, as a possible
biomarker for
FTLD-TDP.