Epitope Mapping: B‐cell Epitopes

GE Morris, Keele University, Keele, Staffordshire, UK

Published online: September 2007

DOI: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0002624.pub2

Immunoglobulin molecules are folded to present a surface structure complementary to a surface feature on the antigen – the epitope is this feature of the antigen. Epitope mapping is the process of locating the antibody-binding site on the antigen, although the term is also applied more broadly to receptor–ligand interactions unrelated to the immune system.

Keywords: antigen; antibody; phage display; mass spectrometry; site-directed mutagenesis; immunoassay

 References
    Barlow DJ, Edwards MS and Thornton JM (1986) Continuous and discontinuous protein antigenic determinants. Nature 322: 747–748.
    Berzoksky JA (1985) Intrinsic and extrinsic factors in protein antigenic structure. Science 219: 932–940.
    Flower DR (2003) Towards in silico prediction of immunogenic epitopes. Trends in Immunology 24: 667–674.
    Hager-Braun C and Tomer KB (2005) Determination of protein-derived epitopes by mass spectrometry. Expert Review of Proteomics 2: 745–756.
    Haste Andersen P, Nielsen M and Lund O (2006) Prediction of residues in discontinuous B-cell epitopes using protein 3D structures. Protein Science 15: 2558–2567.
    Pereboeva LA, Pereboev AV, Wang LF and Morris GE (2000) Hepatitis C epitopes from phage-displayed cDNA libraries and their assembly into improved chimeric antigens. Journal of Medical Virology 60: 144–151.
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    Wilson DS, Keefe AD and Szostak JW (2001) The use of mRNA display to select high-affinity protein-binding peptides. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 98: 3750–3755.
 Further Reading
    book Morris GE (ed.) (1996) Epitope Mapping Protocols, Methods in Molecular Biology, vol. 66. Totowa, NJ: Humana Press. [A laboratory manual with practical details of all methods described here].

Related Sub-Topics:

Diagnostics, Therapeutics and Methods | Antibodies | Protein Structure | Biomolecular Interactions | Proteins: Structure, Function, Metabolism
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Article Title: Epitope Mapping: B‐cell Epitopes
 
How to Cite close
Morris, GE(Sep 2007) Epitope Mapping: B‐cell Epitopes. In: eLS. John Wiley & Sons Ltd, Chichester. http://www.els.net [doi: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0002624.pub2]