Antigens are distinguishing features that our immune systems use to recognize and remember invaders. Microbes can evade our immune defenses by changing their antigens. In this lesson, learn about antigenic shift with influenza virus as an example.
Definition
Antigens are the specific molecular structures that antibodies and other receptors in our immune systems recognize. Antigens and antibodies also form the basis of immunological memory, which is when the immune system responds faster and more powerfully to an infection that it has seen before.From a microbe’s point of view, it’s much easier to infect a host, survive and replicate if the host’s immune system doesn’t recognize you. An antigenic shift is a sudden, drastic change in a microbe’s antigens, and it can help microbes evade the immune system. Unfortunately for the host, this often makes microbes more pathogenic, or capable of causing disease.It’s important not to confuse antigenic shift with antigenic drift, which is a gradual and more minor change in a microbe’s antigens over time.
Example: Influenza Viruses
Influenza Viruses
Influenza viruses are the viruses that cause the flu, one of the most common diseases in the developed world.
Best services for writing your paper according to Trustpilot
When you get the flu, you get headaches, fever, chills, muscle aches and are just generally unhappy for a few days before you recover. But it can also be fatal, especially for very young and very old people.The influenza virus is an enveloped virus that has an outer protein coat made of two spiky proteins called hemagglutinin, or H, and neuraminidase, or N. Inside the virus are eight segments of RNA that encode the virus’s genome.There are at least 15 types of H protein and at least nine types of N protein known.
An influenza virus is named for which H and which N protein it expresses. For example, an H1N3 virus expresses H type 1 and N type 3.
Antigenic Shifts in Influenza
When two or more different influenza viruses infect the same cell, antigenic shifts can occur. Here’s how.
The problem with antigenic shifts is that they can result in new viruses that are able to infect humans but that human immune systems have never seen before.For example, normally, the influenza viruses that infect birds (‘avian influenza viruses’) are not able to infect humans. But if an avian and a human influenza virus infected the same host (for example, a pig in a large industrial farm), a new and dangerous virus could form. It could retain the infectivity of the human virus but gain new antigens from the avian virus, antigens that most humans’ immune systems have never encountered before. Such an antigenic shift could cause a major pandemic, and this is what people are worried about when they talk about swine flu and bird flu. Lesson SummaryIn this lesson, we’ve learned that antigenic shift is a sudden and dramatic change in the antigens that are present on a microbe such as a virus. In the case of influenza, an antigenic shift can occur via reassortment of the RNA segments in a host cell that has been co-infected by two or more different viruses. Antigenic shift can produce new viruses that their hosts have no immunity to, which is great for the virus but can be devastating for the host. Terms ; Definitions
Learning OutcomesUse your knowledge of this lesson on antigenic shift to achieve these goals after studying:
x
Hi! Would you like to get a custom essay? How about receiving a customized one? Check it out |