>> Rick, please can you be bit more specific, in plain language? <<
Proteins from mice and humans are highly homologous. As a human repertoire matures in a mouse, there is regular old negative selection for self-reactivity. You are, therefore, restricted to fishing for epitopes on human proteins which (1) look foreign to a mouse, and (2) are immunogenic. By "immunogenic", I mean that there not only needs to be a "B cell epitope", but also a determinant recognized as foreign by helper T cells from the MuMab mouse. For highly homolgous proteins, it's difficult to find the rare cell to fuse. Abgenix, IMO, has a leg up over Medarex there. |
