IMGT Web resources

 Here you are: IMGT Web resources > IMGT Education > Questions and Answers

QUESTION 4:

How to make 108 different T cell receptor beta chains?

ANSWER to question 4:

From the TRB genes to the T cell receptor beta chains?

The TRB V-D-J rearrangements (D-J then V to D-J rearrangements) in the T cells create a combinatorial diversity of 960-1248 recombinations. One important additional mechanism contributes to the T cell receptor beta diversity: the N diversity (N, for nucleotides) which results from deletion and/or addition of nucleotides at random by the terminal deoxynucleotidyltransferase and creates, at the V-D-J JUNCTION, two regions not encoded in the germline DNA. In contrast to the immunoglobulin loci, there is no mechanism of somatic mutations in the T cell receptor loci.

Created: 11/06/2001
Last updated: Friday, 22-Sep-2023 18:15:35 CEST
Author: Marie-Paule Lefranc Marie-Paule.Lefranc@igh.cnrs.fr
Editor: Elodie Foulquier