# MECHANISMS OF LYMPHOCYTE-ANTIGEN INTERACTIONS

> **NIH NIH R01** · WALTER AND ELIZA HALL INST MEDICAL RES · 1987 · $80,598

## Abstract

The aims of this project are to learn how lymphocyte cells interact with
molecules, both foreign to the body and thus acting as vaccine substances
or antigens, and molecules of the body's own tissues, known as self
antigens.  This encounter between lymphocyte cells, in health, leads to
appropriate defense responses in the first case but to a lack of such in
the second.  Understanding these contrasting roles of antigens, that is,
immune activation and tolerance induction, is one of the central unsolved
problems of immunology.  Solution of the puzzle will be directly relevant
not only to the construction of better and also new vaccines, but also to
better understanding of, and control over, autoimmune diseases and problems
in organ transplantation.

The methods for achieving this understanding will involve culturing single
B lymphocytes that have been specially prepared from normal mouse spleen to
be reactive to (and bear receptors for) one particular antigen.  The cells
will be stimulated with that antigen and with purified growth and
differentiation factors active on B lymphocytes.  Moreover, both antigens
and lymphocytes will be classified into new functional subsets through this
technology, which is novel because it avoids the need to have present in
the culture other, irrelevant cells, which obscure microscopic
visualization of immune proliferation and the interpretation of cellular
events.

The new cloning methods will be applied also to cells that have been made
tolerant either in vivo or in vitro in order to determine why tolerant
cells fail to respond.

The same basic approach of novel cloning technologies will be applied to T
lymphocytes to develop clearer insights into the collaboration between T
and B cells that leads to antibody production.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 3124161
- **Project number:** 5R01AI003958-26
- **Recipient organization:** WALTER AND ELIZA HALL INST MEDICAL RES
- **SAM.gov UEI:** ZVG2YKNTQPB9
- **Principal Investigator:** GUSTAV J NOSSAL
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 1987
- **Award amount:** $80,598
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 1978-06-01 → 1987-12-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/3124161

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 3124161, MECHANISMS OF LYMPHOCYTE-ANTIGEN INTERACTIONS (5R01AI003958-26). Retrieved via MORVS 2026-10-25 from https://api.morvs.ai/grant/nih/3124161. Licensed CC0.

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