Opposites attract in bispecific antibody engineering.

Bispecific antibodies show great promise as intrinsic combination therapies, but often suffer from poor physiochemical properties, many times related to poor heterodimerization. De Nardis et al. identify specific electrostatic interactions that facilitate efficient heterodimerization, resulting in bispecific antibodies with physiochemical properties very similar to those of naturally occurring antibodies. This provides a new platform for the treatment of an array of diseases from cancer and autoimmune diseases to infectious diseases.