On Thu, 20 May 1999, Greg Adams wrote:
> Antibodies that react to the antigen binding domain (CDRs) of another
> antibody are typically called anti-idiotype antibodies. This occurs
> naturally in people and a chain reaction type of effect can occur with
> the antibody (#2) that binds to the antigen binding domain of the first
> antibody (#1), mimicing the original antigen target of the first
> antibody. The second antibody then can actually initiate an immune
> response that will recognize the original antigen. Similar strategies
> are being employed in clinical trials to try to stimulate patients to
> mount an immune response to tumor antigens.
Ahhh. I had a prof in my undergraduate days (Eli Sercarz) that was really
into Niels Jerne's idiotype cascade idea.
I'm sure that antibodies CAN be anti-idiotype, but I wonder about the
biological significance of it....
Is anyone aware of any published research that shows significance of
anti-idiotype antibodies?
+-------------------------------------------------------------+
| Fumitaka Hayashi - hayashi at u.washington.edu |
|http://macrophage.immunol.washington.edu/~fumi/index.html |
| Aderem Lab - Dept. of Immunology - University of Washington |
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