Marilyn Diaz, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, North Carolina, USA
Laurent K Verkoczy, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA
Published online: March 2008
DOI: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0006121.pub2
Analysis of the pattern of immunoglobulin mutation across species has helped to reveal some of the molecular properties of this process. Strong evidence for the involvement of a cytosine deaminase and error-prone deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) polymerases on the DNA encoding the immunoglobulin variable regions confirms earlier predictions made from phylogenetic studies.
Keywords: immunoglobulin; hypermutation; evolution; adaptive immunity; activation-induced deaminase (AID)
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Figure 1. B cells that are activated by antigen form germinal centres in peripheral lymphoid organs such as the spleen and the lymph nodes. There, they divide for 7–21 days and these dividing cells are known as centroblasts. Centroblasts are where somatic hypermutation occurs in V(D)J regions. Subsequently, B cells can differentiate into centrocytes and test their immunoglobulin receptor affinity to antigen in the context of antigen-presenting cells known as follicular dendritic cells. B cells whose receptors have acquired beneficial mutations are selected and differentiate into memory B cells, while the rest – the great majority – undergo apoptosis.
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| Further Reading | |
| Maizels N (1989) Might gene conversion be the mechanism of somatic hypermutation of mammalian immunoglobulin genes? Trends in Genetics 5: 4–8. | |
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| Weigert MG, Cesari IM, Yonkovich SJ and Cohn M (1970) Variability in the L light chain sequences of mouse antibody. Nature 228: 1045–1047. | |
| Weill JC and Reynaud CA (1996) Rearrangement/hypermutation/gene conversion: when, where and why? Immunology Today 17: 92–97. | |
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