Humoral immune response to gonococcal infections

The purpose of this paper is to review the recent advances in the knowledge of humoral immune responses to gonococ- cal infections in humans.The current knowledge of the molecular biology of Neisseria gonorrhoeae, including knowledge of antigen structure and mechanisms that yield antigenic heterogeneity, has outstripped the current knowl- edge of immune responses to the gonococcal antigens.Although it is clear that patients with uncomplicated infec- tions develop increased levels of serum antigonococcal immunoglobulins, it is also evident that because of the new knowledge about antigenic heterogeneity, generalized inter- pretation of results from early studies often is not appropri- ate.Antibodies that are reactive with a given gonococcal antigen may not react at all with the same antigen from another strain of N. gonorrhoeae.Thus, in this review we emphasize data that have taken into account the antigenic heterogeneity or have included conserved antigens of the gonococcus.