What Will B Will B: Identifying Molecular Determinants of Diverse B-Cell Fate Decisions Through Systems Biology

Molecular Biology of B Cells

Antibodies are composed of immunoglobulin-heavy (IgH) and -light (IgL) chains (Figure 1). Structurally, IgH and IgL can be divided into a series of immunoglobulin (Ig) domains. Because of its enormous diversity among different antibodies, the N-terminal IgH and IgL domain is called the variable (V) region. The V regions of IgH and IgL associate to form the antigen-binding region. The remaining ...

What Will Molecular Biology Bring to Our Daily Practice ?

Understanding B Cell Biology

Humoral autoimmunity reflects failures in B cell tolerance and regulation. Accordingly, B cells have long been proposed as targets for treating autoimmune disease. The last decade has witnessed substantial growth in the number of therapeutic agents that target B cells themselves, or molecules key to B cell survival or function. In order to understand, develop, and eventually predict the outcome...

Receptor Cells through the Affinity of the B Cell Imprinting the Fate of Antigen-Reactive B

Imprinting the fate of antigen-reactive B cells through the affinity of the B cell receptor.

Long-lived plasma cells (PCs) and memory B cells (B(mem)) constitute the cellular components of enduring humoral immunity, whereas short-lived PCs that rapidly produce Ig correspond to the host's need for immediate protection against pathogens. In this study we show that the innate affinity of the BCR for Ag imprints upon naive B cells their differentiation fate to become short- or long-lived P...