Human Antibodies

The hybridoma technology is one of the most important advances in clinical immunology. Little is known about the differences between the antibodies produced during the in vivo immune response and those recovered in hybridoma libraries. Here, we investigate a potential fusion bias inherent to the hybridoma production process.

Transgenic rats carrying human Ig heavy and light chain loci were immunized with measles virus (MV) to generate human mAbs. Usin g high-throughput sequencing of IgH mRNA, we compared the IgH repertoire of lymph nodes and the derived hybridoma library using the sequences of the MV-specific hybridoma clones as a reference set with known specificity.

We observed that large clonotypes from the lymph nodes were not represented in the hybridoma library, but low-frequency B cell populations became highly enriched and most hybridoma clones were derived from these. Our data also showed that identical CDR3s evolved from diverse VDJ recombinations, indicating convergence of different B cells subpopulations towards expression of antibodies with similar paratopes.

The efficient generation of mAbs results from a fusion process highly selective for rare antigen-specific B cells rather than in vivo expanded populations. Antibodies of particular interest may therefore be missed during classical hybridoma production.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a complicated disease which occurs due to relationship between genes and environmental factors that causes tissue damage by autoimmune mechanisms.

We investigated and illustrated the hypotheses correlated to the evidence of several putative environmental risk factors for MS onset and progression in this part of Iran.

Univariate logistic regression was used to detect the effects of environmental factors on the risk of MS. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 16.

The childhood history of patients with rubella, measles and chickenpox increased the risk of MS significantly. Moreover, low consumption of dairy products, avoidance of seafood consumption, cigarette smoking and exposure to tobacco smoke, stress, anxiety disorders, depress and disturbing thoughts, negative and disturbing thoughts, developing a sudden shock upon hearing bad news, having obsessive-compulsive and being depressed increased the risk of MS significantly.

The results of the current research partially solved the puzzling question of complex interplay between environmental factors and MS disease in this part of Iran. Incorporating these factors enables more powerful and accurate detection of novel risk factors with diagnostic and prognostic methods.

Since changes in some immune system indicators such as leukocyte count and neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio in the blood and Inflammation is directly in relation with the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome and atherosclerosis, measuring these indicators in patients with type 2 diabetes and comparing them with control group can be a suitable indicator of Inflammation and prognosis of the disease.

The current study was done on 75 patients with type 2 diabetes and 72 healthy individuals as patient and healthy group respectively. The selected groups have been matched for age and sex. Fasting blood sugar, lipid profile including triglycerides, total cholesterol, HDL, LDL, as well as the number of white blood cells, neutrophils, lymphocytes, neutrophils to lymphocytes ratio were measured and analyzed in both groups.

The results demonstrated that there is a significant relationship between the number of white blood cells and increase in blood sugar and also between the neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio and increase in Fasting blood sugar and triglycerides parameters. Furthermore, the average of fasting blood sugar, triglycerides, total cholesterol, LDL and neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio in patient with type 2 diabetes is significantly higher than control group.

Considering the findings of current study, we showed the inflammation and the pathogenesis caused by type 2 diabetes can be attributed to neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) as an autoimmune disorder in which the insulating covers of neurons in the Central Nervous System are destructed. Tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) is an immunomodulatory molecule to protect against T cells hyper activation.

In this Case-control study, we compare TRAIL gene expression in peripheral blood between 50 relapse remitting MS patients and 50 healthy controls by TaqMan Real time PCR. All the patients were negative for HLA-DRB1*15 susceptible allele, normal serum vitamin D, responder to Interferon beta. All the health individuals were matched to patients. Also, we tried to find correlation between TRAIL gene expression and clinical characteristics of patients.

No statistically significant difference was found in TRAIL mRNA expression between MS patients and controls (p> 0.05). There was no correlation in the TRAIL expression and age of onset, disease duration and Expanded Disability Status Scale of Kurtzke(EDSS). As IFN-b may have stimulatory effects on immunoregulatory function of TRAIL and all of our patients were treated with interferon beta and were responder, it lead to no significant change in TRAIL expression. We suggest comparing between responders and non-responders should be investigated.