Continuous production of monoclonal mouse IgE antibodies with known allergenic specificity by a hybrid cell line

Abstract

SINCE the identification of IgE antibodies as mediators of allergic reactions by Ishizaka et al.¹ extensive work has been done to purify this new type of immunoglobulin from the serum of allergic patients and animals However, all attempts so far have been limited by the very low serum concentration of these reaginic antibodies This difficulty has been partly overcome with the detection of the extremely rarely occurring IgE-producing myelomas of the human² and the rat³, although IgE myelomas of other species are lacking Moreover, none of the available IgE-myeloma proteins has a known allergenic specificity, which is indispensable for several important applications to future studies on the origin and mechanism of allergic processes Here we describe a new murine cell line which is continuously producing high amounts of IgE antibodies with anti-ovalbumin (OA) specificity This cell line was generated by cell fusion of murine myeloma cells with spleen cells from OA-hyperimmunised mice following the cell hybridisation technique developed by Köhler and Milstein⁴.