Preface

Immunology science has made prominent progress in recent years, helping in all medical fields from diagnosis to treatment. Nowadays, immunotherapy procedures are used in the treatment of a variety of autoimmune diseases, cancers, and organ transplants. It has also paved the way for medical researchers toward a promising future in the treatment of immunological disorders. Immune-based therapies are widely explored in several immunological disorders due to their high specificity and sensitivity. Since the approval of the first monoclonal antibody (mAb) in 1986, mAbs have been used as a novel way of targeting antigens in these disorders. Currently, mAbs are an important group of therapeutic molecules in clinical trials for treating disorders such as inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, malignancies, and cardiovascular and infectious diseases.

This book provides knowledge about several types of mAbs and their application in the clinic and laboratory. The introduction describes mAbs, their structure, and their production process. Subsequent chapters cover more information about the therapeutic application of mAbs, especially in urology and oncology and for multiple myeloma. Furthermore, the book discusses the production and characterization of mAbs. In this regard, chapters examine alternative methods to animal use for generating mAbs as well as novel analytical and *in silico* techniques for characterizing them. These methods can provide comprehensive information about technologies associated with mAb production.

The book describes and discusses immunology concepts and mechanisms related to the function of mAbs in a clear and simple way, making the information herein useful for scientists and clinicians in various fields.

> **Nima Rezaei, MD, Ph.D.** Research Center for Immunodeficiencies, Children's Medical Center, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

Network of Immunity in Infection, Malignancy and Autoimmunity (NIIMA), Universal Scientific Education and Research Network (USERN), Tehran, Iran

**1**

**Chapter 1**

**Abstract**

Antibodies

Introduction on Monoclonal

Monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) are a group of antibodies produced by identical clones of B lymphocytes against a particular antigen. mAbs are identical in several properties such as protein sequence, antigen-binding site region, binding affinity for their targets, and identical downstream functional effects. These characteristics of mAbs highlight their differences with the polyclonal antibodies which have heterogenous activities and recognize different epitopes on an antigen. Murine mAbs was the first generation of mAbs developed by hybridoma technology however, because of their murine origin, they can trigger the anti-mouse antibody response in the host which could accelerate mAb clearance and undesirable allergic reactions upon repeated administration. This issue was resolved by developing engineering methods toward producing less immunologic chimeric or humanized antibodies. mAbs applications have become a novel way of targeting antigens in a wide variety of diseases such as autoimmunity, malignancies, and asthma. In addition, high specificity and high affinity binding properties of mAbs make them effective biological reagents in immunodiagnostic assays. They can be used in diagnosis of infectious diseases and detection of certain antigens or in serological assessments for detection of antibodies against a certain antigen. This chapter summarizes the general properties of mAbs, their production processes, and their important

**Keywords:** monoclonal antibodies, mAb, chimeric mAb, humanized mAb,

Antibodies or immunoglobulins (Ig) are glycoproteins produced by differentiated B lymphocytes named "plasma cells" in response to exposure to antigens. The diversity of antibody responses to different antigens is because of the gene recombination process in the hyper-variable regions of antibodies. During the recombination process in their genes, antibodies undergo gene rearrangement that allows them for diverse binding [1]. High specificity and diversity of antibodies have made them popular molecules with very high efficiencies in several therapeutic or

Monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) are a group of antibodies produced by identical clones of B lymphocytes against a particular antigen. Monoclonal antibodies are identical in several properties such as protein sequence, antigen-binding site region, binding affinity for their targets, and identical downstream functional effects. These characteristics of mAbs highlight their differences with the

*Mona Sadeghalvad and Nima Rezaei*

diagnostic and therapeutic applications.

fully humanized mAb

diagnostic applications.

**1. Introduction**
