The phenomenon of idiotypy was discovered almost thirty years ago,
but it was only during the past decade that it attracted widespread
interest and became the subject of numerous research
investigations. From the outset, much of the interest in idiotypy
was based on its implications with respect to the repertoire of
antibodies. Kunkel showed, for example, that idiotypes associated
with certain human myeloma or Bence-Jones proteins were present in
normal human globulins at levels of less than one part per million.
Also, Oudin's original definition of idiotypy implied that
idiotypes could be uniquely associated with individual rabbits as
well as with particular antigen-binding specificities. Such
observations provided some of the earliest evidence for an
extensive repertoire of immunoglobulin molecules. The implications
of these findings have been amply confirmed by recent studies of
protein struc ture and molecular genetics; many of these studies
are reviewed in the present volume. It is known now that the
diversity of antibodies is based on the presence of numerous V and
L V H genes, on recombinatorial events involving D and] segments,
on somatic mutations, and on processes involving deletion of DNA
followed by repair with errors, including inser tions. Each of
these parameters is capable of influencing the idiotype expressed
by the final immunoglobulin product. Regulation of the immune
response is another area in which idiotypy has significantly
influenced modern immunology.
General
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