Dextramer technology
A large number of immunotherapies, currently in development, seek to induce, expand, activate or eliminate antigen-specific T cells. It is therefore important to be able to quantify and characterize the T cell responses before, during and after treatment in order to understand if the proposed change to the T cells has been effectuated.
The process of negative selection in the thymus guarantees that virtually all T cells have very weak affinity for self-antigens. Therefore, the study of these lymphocytes in autoimmune diseases and cancer has been difficult, until the fairly recent introduction of MHC multimers. Tetramers, which are among the most popular form of these multimer complexes, have four binding sites. The Tetramers were originally developed in Academia. Many further developments in this technology have taken place at biotechnology companies.
The Immudex MHC Dextramers, which represent the latest advancement in this field, provide an exponentially greater probability of successful identification of antigen-specific T cells. This can be done, because the MHC Dextramers have nine, or more binding sites per dextran backbone. Scientists have been optimistic about the potential of such technology, since it will help broaden the understanding of T cell responses and will in the future be clinically applicable to many different antigen-specific T cells.
Products
The MHC Dextramers are fluorescent MHC multimer reagents, developed for sensitive, specific and accurate detection of antigen-specific T cells by using Flow cytometry. The MHC Dextramers covers human, mouse, and monkey alleles that all display disease relevant antigenic peptides. The MHC Dextramers can thereby be used for monitoring antigen-specific T cell responses.
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Virus Dextramer collection 1 - provides reagents for detection, quantification and isolation of virus specific T cells. It furthermore enables detection for CMV-, EBV-, influenza-, and BK virus specific CD8+ T cells.
Dextramer CMV kit - These MHC Dextramers provide a method for quantification of CMV-specific CD8+ T cells in whole blood samples as an aid in predicting and monitoring patients at risk of developing CMV-related disease.
Melanoma Dextramer collection 1 - comprises MHC Dextramers specific for 6 different melanoma-associated antigens and can be used for the detection, enumeration and isolation of melanoma-specific CD8+ T cells from blood or tumor tissue.
Cancer Testis Antigen CD1d Dextramer - These MHC Dextramers are flow cytometry reagents for the identification and sorting of Natural killer cells (NKT), as well as an extensive range of single reagents for detection of cancer- and viral-specific T cells. The CD1d/α-GalCer displays human CD1d molecules loaded with α-GalCer.
