Interchain disulphide bridges

In humans, TcRy s are heterogeneous in structure it is not clear whether this heterogeneity has functional relevance and/or whether it identifies different classes of T cells. Data from different laboratories are tentatively summarized in Table 3. On the basis of the presence of interchain disulphide bridges, two forms can be distinguished, the non-disulphide-bonded form probably representing more than... 

It is noteworthy that the stretch in the H chain which contains the interchain disulphide bonds (hinge region) has no homologous counterpart in other positions of H or L chains. In fact the inter-H chain bridges present... 

Figure 1.10. The site of specific cleavage of human fi chain by trypsin. Fab and Fc t are defined as the fragments obtained by tryptic digestion of IgM at 60 °C, whereas (Fab )2 is the analogous dimeric fragment obtained with trypsin at 37 C at which temperature Fc t is degraded to peptides Fc is a pentamer because of the presence of intersubunit (IS) disulphide bonds (see text). Also shown is the site of specific cleavage of human yl chain by papain, trypsin and pepsin the Fc fragment may be a monomer or dimer depending on the state of the H— H interchain bridges.

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