Frequency of antigen specific B-cells following immunisation?

[rotters]

Dear all

,

I have recently immunised some mice with a human tumour antigen in combination with Abisco adjuvant with a booster injection fours weeks after the first. I got a really good antibody response when testing via ELISA and have used the mouse spleens to isolate Vh and Vl chains from these animals. What I do not have any feel for is what sort of frequency (abundance) I can expect my antigen-specific B-cells to be in the total population of the cells I have isolated - could someone give me a rough idea?

 

I know this is dependent on lots of variables but I really just wanted to have a general idea. Could I expect a frequency of 1% of total B-cells being antigen specific or would it be a couple of logs lower than that?

 

I am not an immunologist (obviously!) and would really appreciate an expert opinion on this?

 

Many thanks,

 

Dominic