Immunogenicity

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Immunogenicity is the ability of a particular substance, such as an antigen or epitope, to provoke an immune response.

Immunogenicity

The ability to induce humoral and/or cell-mediated immune responses.

The ability of antigen to elicit immune response is called "immunogenicity."

Antigens that do provoke the immune response are ”immunogens."

Immunogenic potency of antigens

Proteins are significantly more immunogenic than polysaccharides.

Since lipids and nucleic acids are non-immunogenic haptens, they require conjugation with an epitope such as a protein or polysaccharide before they can evoke an immunologic response.

• Proteins or polysaccharides are used for studies of humoral immune response.

• Only proteins can serve as immunogens for cell-mediated immunity.

Factors influencing immunogenicity

• Contribution of antigen to immunogenicity

• Contribution of biological system to immunogenicity

Antigens and immunogenicity

Immunogenicity is influenced by multiple characteristics of an antigen:

• Phylogenetic distance

• Molecular size

• Epitope density

• Chemical composition and heterogeneity

• Protein structure, aa-polymers, Glu-Lys, Tyr, Phe

• Degradability (ability to be processed & presented to T cells)

• D-amino acids

References

See also

• Vaccines
• Adaptive immune system
• Immunostimulator

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