PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - József Prechl
TI  - Thermodynamic projection of the antibody interaction network: the binding fountain energy landscape
AID  - 10.1101/124503
DP  - 2017 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 124503
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/04/05/124503.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/04/05/124503.full
AB  - The clonal humoral immune system shows all the distinctive characteristics of evolution: governed by selection pressures, clones of genetically diverse and genetically changing B-cells survive and expand, generating a network of cells that produce antibodies, which modulate concentrations of their targets. Availability of targets exerts the selection pressures in turn. In an individual’s lifetime this continuous reverberating loop appears as the change of antibody profile, reflecting the immunological balance of self and non-self recognition. We have recently developed a quantitative model for the description of antibody homeostasis as defined by the dimensions of antigen concentration, antigen-antibody interaction affinity and antibody concentration. Here we project this interaction space onto an energy landscape defined by conformational entropy and free energy of binding. We introduce the concept of binding fountain energy landscape, which allows the thermodynamic representation of binding events and paths of multiple interactions. We further show that the hypersurface of the binding fountain corresponds to the antibody-antigen interaction network. We demonstrate that thymus independent and thymus dependent antibody responses show distinct patterns of changes in the energy landscape. Overall, the binding fountain energy landscape concept allows a systems biological, thermodynamic perception of the functioning of the clonal humoral immune system.