What would be found if antibodies from people not infected with Lyme disease wer!


Question:

What would be found if antibodies from people not infected with Lyme disease were exposed to Lyme bacteria?

And also, kind of related, if an uninfected person were injected with Lyme disease bacteria, what would happen?


Answers:

I don't think you really know what antibodies are and how they occur. When a foreign organism - and we can use the spirochete, Borrelia burgdorferi, that causes Lyme - enters the body, this bacteria has a protein on its surface. This protein is called an antigen. Let's assume this is the first time this body has ever encountered the spirochete.

The body recognizes the protein (antigen) as foreign. Lymphocytes, one type of white blood cell, produce antibodies, a type of immunglobulin, another protein. These antibodies are specific to the antigens that triggered their production in the first place.

Antibodies work in various ways. Some bind to the antigen, the protein on the bacterial surface and start a chain reaction that ultimately causes harm to the bacteria or protects the host body. Other antibodies bind to white cells and activate their individual functions as part of the immune response.

So, to answer your first question (go back and read it again), nothing. Whatever antibodies you used would not have been produced specifically for the antigen on the spirochete bacteria. Without infection, no antigen-specific antibodies. Understand?

To answer your second question, you have only to read my explanation of antibodies and antigens.




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