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Will the idiotypic network help to solve natural tolerance?

António Coutinho1

  • 1Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência, PT-2781-901, OEIRAS, Portugal. coutinho@igc.gulbenkian.pt

Trends in Immunology
|January 28, 2003
PubMed

A recent paper on immunity and tolerance to antigenic determinants on antibody variable-regions (idiotypes) brings back to light the potential of idiotypic interactions among antibodies, B cells and T cells in the regulation of specific immune activities. The functional significance of idiotypic regulation has been established in a variety of systems, both concerning the establishment of 'pre-immune' diversity repertoires as well as the clonal regulation of immune responses to foreign and self-antigens. Also, recently the requirement for 'dominant' regulatory mechanisms in natural tolerance has received increasing support. It might thus be fruitful to evaluate the possibility that an idiotypic network has a fundamental role in the operation of the regulatory T cells that establish and maintain self-tolerance.

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