The Way We Walked with Immunology.

It has been a little more than 50 years since we discovered IgE, a key molecule for the allergic response and a target for treating allergies and severe asthma. Here, I trace my career, from the kindling of my interest in immunochemistry to groundbreaking discoveries in the biology and chemistry of immunoglobulins. I describe my service to the broader community of immunologists and my role in shaping departments and research institutes.

Identification of IgE.

Progress in protein chemistry in the 1950s revealed that the biologic activities of proteins, such as hemoglobin and enzymes, are based on partial structures in the protein molecules. This principle suggested to us the possibility that the human antibodies responsible for induction of reaginic hypersensitivity reactions might have unique structures that are lacking in the antibody molecules involved in immunity and that the differences in the structures of human antibody molecules can be recognized by the immune systems of experimental animals. Our studies were based on the hypothesis that reaginic antibody activity is associated with a unique immunoglobulin isotype, which is now called IgE.

Mast cells and IgE: from history to today.

Role of mast cells in allergy had remained undetermined until the discovery of IgE in 1966. Then, IgE purified from many Liters of plasma, which had been donated from a patient with fatal myeloma, was distributed to researchers all over the world, and thus accelerated exploring the mechanisms involved in allergic reactions, particularly about the role of mast cells and basophils in the IgE-mediated reactions. Identification of mast cells as a progeny of a bone marrow hematopoietic stem cell in 1977 led us to successful in vitro culture of human mast cells.