PMID: 8960776Nov 1, 1996Paper

Tissue homeostatic role of naturally occurring anti-band 3 antibodies

Cellular and Molecular Biology
Hans U LutzR Hornig

Abstract

Self antigens exposed to the immune system constitutively or in the process of tissue homeostasis may stimulate a TH2 type immunity giving rise to low titer, low affinity naturally occurring antibodies which are involved in actively maintaining peripheral tolerance to self and in tissue homeostatic clearance processes. In reviewing the tissue homeostatic aspect of naturally occurring antibodies to band 3 protein of the human erythrocyte membrane, we address crucial issues of how these and other types of naturally occurring antibodies (NAb) (eg. anti-spectrin NAb) gain functionality and how this can induce opsonization by complement C3b under physiological conditions. Exoplasmic, chemical cross-linking of band 3 protein is sufficient to increase specific anti-band 3 binding under physiological conditions. Formation of oligomers following this non-oxidative cross-linking protocol disfavors a recognition mechanism involving exposure of a neoantigen. New data on NAb binding to erythrocytes further demonstrates that specific binding of any low affinity NAb can only be determined in the presence of whole human IgG and physiological ionic strength, where competition of the predominantly positively charged NAb for binding to the negati...Continue Reading

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