Antigenic modulation - a major mechanism of antibody action.

It is a prudent rule in science that any new indisputable observation is worthy of interest and further investigation, even when it seems a priori anecdotal or outside the scope of current studies. This was the case, in the early 1960s, with antigenic modulation, which was initially considered as an interesting serological curiosity and is now established as a major mechanism of antibody action. In this article Lucienne Chatenoud and Jean-François Bach discuss new roles for antigenic modulation in viral and autoimmune disease pathogenesis and in the escape from tumors and the therapeutic action of monoclonal antibodies.