Patent ID: 7504202

Claim:
A competitive method for detecting Bacillus anthracis in a sample comprising the steps: a. intermixing said sample, with a specific antibody to Bacillus anthracis protective antigen, and a competitive reagent comprising a Bacillus anthracis polypeptide labeled with a fluorochrome capable of binding to said specific antibody, to produce a mixture; b. incubating said mixture for 15 seconds to 5 minutes; c. measuring the fluorescence polarization of said mixture, a negative control solution of said fluorochrome-labeled competitive reagent, and a positive control solution of said fluorochrome-labeled competitive reagent exposed to a known amount of said Bacillus anthracis protective antigen; d. detecting binding interaction between said Bacillus anthracis protective antigen in the sample and said antibody by comparing the measured fluorescence polarization of said mixture with the measured fluorescence polarization of said negative control solution, and said positive control solution.