B-Cell Epitopes

Chapter 10

Antibodies

Antibody - Antigen interaction

Fab

Antigen

Epitope

Paratope

Antibody

Antibody Effect

Virus or Toxin

Neutralizing Antibodies

B-Cells

B-lymphocytes each displaying a unique B-cell receptor

Stem Cell

Precurser B-lymphocytes

Gene rearrangements

Gene Shuffling

José Saldanha © 2000. Birkbeck College, London WC1E 7HX.

B-Cell ActivationNo Affinity

Low Affinity

No Affinity

High Affinity

Somatic Hypermutations

Memory B-cells

Plasma cells

B-Cell Activation

B Cell

T Helper Cell

Class II MHC

Bound Peptide

TCR

Cartoon by Eric Reits

Structural Epitopes

Discontinuous Epitopes

Variable regionsAlpha-carbon trace of the structure of the heavy chain and light chain variable regions of a typical antibody. The framework regions of both chains are shown in grey whilst the complementarity determining regions (CDRs) are coloured individually, i.e.

Heavy chainCDR 1 = Light blueCDR 2 = CeriseCDR 3 = Yellow Light ChainCDR 1 = RedCDR 2 = GreenCDR 3 = Blue

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CDR Regions

CDR = complementarity determining region

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