Amino acid sequence of homogeneous antibodies to dextran and DNA rearrangements in heavy chain V-region gene segments.

The complete variable region sequences from ten antibodies and two myeloma proteins binding alpha-1,3 dextran have been determined. The diversity patterns of these homogeneous antibody molecules suggest that the variable regions of heavy chains are encoded by separate variable (V) and joining (J) gene segments. The most striking feature of these data is the extensive sequence variability of a region that we denote the D (diversity) segment which is located at the junction between the V and J segments in the centre of the third hypervariable region. The D segment diversity may arise from a novel somatic mutational mechanism or may be encoded by multiple D gene segments. For the first time, the amino acid sequence correlates of several V region idiotypes are determined.