Abstract
Background: Somatic hypermutation (SHM) of immunoglobulin variable (V) regions in B cells is the molecular basis for the diversification of antibodies in response to pathogens and vaccines and, therefore, for robust long-term humoral immunity. Mutations are generated by activation-induced cytidine deaminase (AID) which converts cytosines to uracils preferentially at WRCH motifs (where W =…