Many phylogenetically diverse organisms use antigenic variation to avoid recognition by the immune system. varDB was developed to serve as a centralized database of antigenically variable protein families from a range of pathogenic organisms. Infectious diseases and their pathogens are often studied in isolation, but observations made in one species may be used to formulate hypotheses relevant to other taxa. VarDB is intended to facilitate large-scale examination of the evolution of antigenic gene families and help provide insight into how a conserved function can be maintained despite extreme sequence diversity.

Figure 2. Gene conversion is one of several mechanisms of antigenic variation. The gene in (A) can be replaced by an alternative form elsewhere in the genome, changing the gene that is expressed (B).

This website was developed as part of a collaboration between Kyoto University in Japan and the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.