Unpublished draft

HLA-A

HLA-A is a class I major histocompatibility complex molecule: the cell-surface display protein that presents intracellular peptide fragments to CD8 T cells, making the interior of every cell visible to immune surveillance.

Function

HLA-A binds short peptides (8-10 amino acids) generated by the proteasome from the cell’s own proteins - including proteins from viruses and from mutated oncogenes - and carries them to the cell surface for inspection by CD8 T cells. A T cell whose receptor recognizes a presented peptide as foreign kills the displaying cell. Each person expresses three HLA-A alleles (one from each parent, out of thousands in the