POSSIBILITIES FOR THE USE OF MONOCLONAL-A NTIBODIES IN THERAPY

With the introduction of the B-cell hybridoma technology, where antibo dy producing B-lymphocytes are immortalized by fusion with myeloma cel ls it became possible to produce monoclonal antibodies of almost any d esired antigen specificity. Although this technique has been described already 19 years ago and the therapeutic potential of many monoclonal s has been established since, so far only a single monoclonal antibody is widely used in the clinic. The application of murine monoclonal an tibodies for human therapy is hampered by a short half-life in the cir culation, inefficient activation of human antibody effector functions and the development of undesired immune responses against the xenogeni c antibody protein epitopes. As techniques for genetic manipulations o f murine antibodies and for production of human antibodies are current ly developing rapidly, it can be expected that these problems will not impede the successful application of therapeutic monoclonal antibodie s in the future.