A recent paper in Nature sheds welcome light on the mechanism of somatic hypermutation by documenting the participation of double-strand DNA breaks. The antibody response, which occurs in ...

Activation-induced cytidine deaminase (AID) plays a crucial role in the immune system by facilitating somatic hypermutation (SHM) and class switch recombination (CSR) in B cells. These processes ...

"This effect is based on a step in antibody maturation called somatic hypermutation," says Dr. Matthias Bruhn, first author of the study and postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for ...

The BCR IGH is coded for by multiple genes, including VDJ genes. Only productive and functional IG rearrangements are retained in B-cells. IGH gene rearrangements in B-cells undergo additional somatic ...