9 a The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, 1G Royal Parade, Parkville, 10 Victoria, 3050, Australia 11 b School of Computer Science and IT, RMIT University, Melbourne, 3001, Australia 12 c Cooperative Research Centre for Vaccine Technology, Department of Biochemistry, 13 La Trobe University, Bundoora, Victoria, 3083, Australia 14 15

Modulation of human NK cell function by killer cell Ig-like receptors (KIR) and MHC class I is dominated by the bipartite interactions of inhibitory lineage III KIR with the C1 and C2 epitopes of HLA-C. In comparison, the ligand specificities and functional contributions of the activating lineage III KIR remain poorly understood. Using a robust, sensitive assay of KIR binding and a representati...

Jane E Visvader* and Geoffrey J Lindeman Stem Cells and Cancer Division, The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, Melbourne, Australia, Department of Medical Biology, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia, Department of Medical Oncology, The Royal Melbourne Hospital, Melbourne, Australia and Department of Medicine, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia *C...

The efficient in vitro expansion of antigen-specific CD8+ cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTL) for use in adoptive immunotherapy represents an important clinical goal. Furthermore, the avidity of expanded CTL populations often correlates closely with clinical outcome. In our study, high-avidity CTL lines could be expanded ex vivo from an antigen-primed animal using low peptide concentration, and inter...

Interaction between antigen and antibody modulates key biological processes in neutralizing and eliminating pathogenic microorganisms following infection. The strength of this interaction depends on the affinity, valency and three dimensional arrangements of the interacting epitopes and paratopes. The measure of the overall strength of this multimeric interaction is termed as ‘Avidity’. Develop...

The presence of high-avidity CTLs in the right compartment can greatly affect clearance of a virus infection (for example, AIDS viral infection of and dissemination from mucosa). Comparing mucosal vs systemic immunization, we observed a novel compartmentalization of CTL avidity and proportion of functionally active Ag-specific CD8(+) T cells to tissues proximal to sites of immunization. Whereas...

Diagnosis of primary human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) infection is accomplished exclusively by serologic testing. Among the possible methods, the determination of immunoglobulin G (IgG) avidity is one of the least explored. In this work, we used a commercially available kit to test anti-HCMV IgG avidity in 336 serum samples from pregnant women and transplant recipients undergoing virologically prov...

Serum samples, 100 in the total number, were collected from different laboratories in Tehran, Iran and tested for anti-Toxoplasma specific IgG and IgM antibodies using indirect immunofluorescent antibody test (IFAT). Using the IgG (chronic) and IgM (acute) positive samples, the IgG avidity test was performed by ELISA in duplicate rows of 96-well microtiter plates. One row was washed with 6 M ur...

St Vincent’s Institute, Fitzroy, VIC 3065, Australia, Centre for Functional Genomics and Human Disease, Monash Institute of Medical Research, Monash University, 27-31 Wright Street, Clayton, VIC 3168, Australia, The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, 1G Royal Parade, Parkville, VIC 3050, Australia, Amgen, One Amgen Centre Drive, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320, USA and Ludwig Institute for Cancer Researc...