The use of Epstein-Barr virus transformation for the production of human monoclonal antibodies.

Current aspects of the production of murine and human monoclonal antibodies are reviewed. The use of murine monoclonal antibodies in the treatment of a variety of human tumors has met with limited success due to reactions to the xenogeneic antibodies. Human antibodies offer certain potential advantages for therapeutic use and because of this interest, techniques including hybridization and EBV transformation are being developed for their production. We contrast these two methods and emphasize the special relationship that exists between EBV and human B lymphocytes. Results from this and other laboratories suggest that transformation alone or in combination with hybridization will be a viable method for producing human antibodies with useful specificities.