Production of Monoclonal Antibodies

Three decades after the advent of hybridoma technology, the development of monoclonal antibodies (mAb) continues to uphold the hopes of Kohler and Milstein as reagents “valuable for medical and industrial use.”1 Hybridoma technology and the generation of mAb have revolutionized research, providing limitless quantities of unique reagents capable of identifying, isolating, eliminating, activating, or targeting specic antigens and offering great promise as therapeutic agents in a variety of disease models. Improved immunization strategies now allow for more rapid and efcient generation of humoral responses to a wide variety of antigenic stimuli using a broad collection of hosts. Technical advances have also provided better and more rapid means of hybridoma screening and antibody production. In addition, advances in genetic engineering permit the modication of mAb for clinical use with increased efcacy and decreased toxicity. Thus, while we continue to modify and improve upon many of the originally described technical aspects, hybridoma technology remains a vital tool in scientic discovery and clinical therapy.