George J, Claflin L
Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor 48109-0620.
Semin Immunol. 1992 Feb;4(1):11-7.
During a humoral immune response, a variety of histological, cellular, and molecular changes occur within the immune system. In this review, we would like to summarize and integrate these changes with a view toward gaining insight into the process of clonal selection. We describe here how antigen receptor number limits the sensitivity of a B cell to transduce a signal in response to antigen. We have also seen that this limitation can be compensated for by expressing a higher affinity receptor for antigen. These data suggest that the down regulation of antigen binding receptors in germinal center cells might be designed to exploit anticipated increases in affinity that result from somatic hypermutation in these tissues. This hypothesis is consistent with observed biological changes that occur during an immune response and has bearing on both the mechanism of affinity maturation and generation of immunologic memory.
在体液免疫反应过程中，免疫系统内会发生各种组织学、细胞和分子变化。在本综述中，我们希望总结并整合这些变化，以期深入了解克隆选择过程。我们在此描述抗原受体数量如何限制B细胞转导抗原应答信号的敏感性。我们还发现，这种限制可以通过表达对抗原有更高亲和力的受体来弥补。这些数据表明，生发中心细胞中抗原结合受体的下调可能是为了利用这些组织中体细胞超突变导致的预期亲和力增加。这一假设与免疫反应过程中观察到的生物学变化一致，并且与亲和力成熟机制和免疫记忆的产生都有关系。
