Nanobody

Dear Colleagues,

Since their first description 25 years ago, single-domain antibody fragments, derived from heavy-chain-only antibodies of camelids, so-called nanobodies, have emerged as attractive alternatives to conventional antibodies for multiple applications in biomedical research. Compared to other small antibody fragments like Fab or scFv, nanobodies have numerous advantages. First, only one domain has to be cloned and expressed to generate a fully functional binding molecule. Secondly, nanobodies are highly soluble and stable, can be easily genetically or chemically modified, and produced in various cells and/or organisms. Microbial expression systems enable the production of purified nanobodies in the mg–g range per liter of culture, thereby offering an unlimited supply of consistent binding molecules.

To date nanobodies have become outstanding tools for in vitro and in vivo imaging, as well as structural and proteome analysis. As genetically encoded intrabodies, they open new possibilities for visualization or functional studies on proteins in living cells. The recently described advances in identification of antigen-specific nanobodies from synthetic gene libraries now makes nanobody-based approaches broadly available to many researches in the field.

This Special Issue is aimed to provide an up-to-date overview of the rising field of nanobodies including generation and functionalization of nanobodies as well as their application for immunoassays, proteomics, protein crystallization and in vitro and in vivo imaging.

Prof. Ulrich Rothbauer
Dr. Patrick Chames
Guest Editor

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