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. 2019 May 17;10:1081. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2019.01081

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Copyright © 2019 Couture, Garnier, Docagne, Boyer, Vivien, Le-Mauff, Latouche and Toutirais.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

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The MHC-II antigen presentation pathways. Major histocompatibility complex class II (MHC-II) α and β chains, expressed by antigen presenting cells (APCs), are synthetized in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) where they form a heterotrimer with the invariant chain (Ii). After maturation in the Golgi apparatus, the heterotrimer (α/β/Ii) is delivered to the MHC class II compartment (MIIC) in which endocytosed and exogenous proteins but also Ii are degraded by proteases for generating peptides. Ii is progressively degraded into the Class II Invariant chain Peptide (CLIP) which binds to the MHC-II groove. The chaperone protein HLA-DM induces CLIP replacement by an antigenic peptide. Then, the peptide/MHC-II complexes move to the plasma membrane and are presented to T-cell receptors (TCRs) of CD4⁺ T lymphocytes.