Nanobody; an Old Concept and New Vehicle for Immunotargeting

Abstract

The use of antibodies in cancer therapy has come a long way since the day Paul Ehrlich described the concept and Kohler and Milstein devised the hybridoma technology to bring this theory to reality. The synthesis of murine monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) was the first success in this field, leading to the invention of chimerization, the production of variable fragments (Fv) with the progression to domain antibodies (dAb) and later humanization technologies to maximize the clinical utility of murine mAbs. It was just by chance that dAbs were found to exist in ‘heavy chain’ immunoglobulins from Camelidae family and cartilaginous fish. These unique antibody fragments interact with antigen by virtue of only one single variable domain, referred to as VHH or nanobody. Several characteristics make nanobody use superior to the abovementioned antibodies. They are non-immunogenic and show high thermal and chemical stability. There are several reports of raising specific nanobodies against enzymes, haptens, pathogens, toxins and tumor markers, which are outlined in this paper. All these characteristics make them strong candidates as targeting agents for cancer therapy.

• Nanobody
• Single domain antibody
• Camel
• Immunotargeting

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

We would also like to thank Dr. Ladan Parhamifar for her critical language revision of the manuscript.

Declaration of interest: The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

Notes

¹Food and Drug Administration