Antibody Formation

Summary Avidity of guinea pig antibodies to bacteriophage φX 174 was studied by means of the decision-tube and reactivation methods of Jerne and Avegno. The avidity of both γM and γG antibodies increased with time after immunization. γM antibody obtained 1 week after immunization usually had a higher avidity than γG antibody obtained 2 weeks after immunization. The possibility that the relatively high avidity of γM antibody is caused by multiple binding between a single phage particle and one γM antibody molecule is discussed.