Rituximab is a genetically engineered chimeric murine and human monoclonal antibody. It is of the IgG class, specifically an IgG kappa immunoglobulin containing murine light and heavy-chain variable region sequences and human constant region sequences. Rituximab's two heavy chains are 451 amino acids long and its two light chains are 213 amino acids long. Its chemical formula is C6416H9874N1688O1987S44, and the average weight of this large protein is 143,850.7 Da.
Function
Rituximab was created to treat certain cancers and autoimmune diseases, including non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, chronic lymphocytic leukemia, rheumatoid arthritis, idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura, and pemphigus vulgaris. Since it is a biologic, Rituximab must be given intravenously.
Rituximab's target is CD20 on the surface of malignant (and normal, since differentiation is impossible, like many other cancer treatments) B cells. It binds to CD20 - specifically, amino acids 170-173 and 182-185 on CD20 - and increased the effectiveness of natural killer cells by up to 80% (34, 31/32).
Disease
Relevance
Structural highlights
This is a sample scene created with SAT to by Group, and another to make of the protein. You can make your own scenes on SAT starting from scratch or loading and editing one of these sample scenes.
