Self-tolerance curtails the B cell repertoire to microbial epitopes.

ABSTRACT: Immunological tolerance removes or inactivates self-reactive B cells, including those that also recognize cross-reactive foreign antigens. Whereas a few microbial pathogens exploit these "holes" in the B cell repertoire by mimicking host antigens to evade immune surveillance, the extent to which tolerance reduces the B cell repertoire to foreign antigens is unknown. Here, we use single-cell cultures to determine the repertoires of human B cell antigen receptors (BCRs) before (transitional B cells) and after (mature B cells) the second B cell tolerance checkpoint in both healthy donors and in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) . In healthy donors, the majority (~70%) of transitional B cells that recognize foreign antigens also bind human self-antigens (foreign+self), and perip

SUBMITTER: Watanabe A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6542615 | biostudies-literature | 2019 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature