Clonal selection theory
Teoría de la selección clonal
- Date
- 1957 · confidence high
- Place
- Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
- Credited to
- Frank Macfarlane Burnet (with David Talmage)
- People
- 👤 Frank Macfarlane Burnet1899–1985
- Field
- Life & health
What was discovered
Each lymphocyte produces a single antibody, and those that recognise an antigen multiply into clones. It explains immune specificity and memory, and tolerance to the body's own tissues.
Talmage proposed a similar idea the same year; Burnet shared the 1960 Nobel Prize with Medawar for immune tolerance.
What it led to
- modern immunology
- monoclonal antibodies
- the explanation of autoimmunity