The Primordial Vrm System and Evolution of Vertebrate Immunity (Molecular Biology Intelligence Unit) - Hardcover

Stewart, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1570591199 ISBN 13: 9781570591198

Publisher: R G Landes Co, 1994

Synopsis

This book discusses the evolutionary origin of immunoglobulins and T-cell receptors. The complex interactions between B and T cells in response to external antigens are the major focus of contemporary immunology. This book argues that these interactions may be relatively late evolutionary developments, due to the redeployment of a system invented for other reasons. In other words immunoglobulins did not arise in evolution to fight infection. The author theorizes that the system of variable region moleculars (VRM) arose at the time of the first vertebrates by an endogenous, self-organizing process. This primordial VRM system instituted a molecular ecology, a function so vital that from then on no vertebrate has been able to do without it.

Edition details

• Publisher: R G Landes Co
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 1570591199
• ISBN 13: 9781570591198
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 124