IMGT, the international ImMunoGeneTics information system http://imgt.cines.fr, 
was created in 1989 by the Laboratoire d'ImmunoGénétique Moléculaire (LIGM) 
(Université Montpellier II and CNRS) at Montpellier, France. IMGT is a high 
quality integrated knowledge resource specialized in immunoglobulins (IG), T 
cell receptors (TR), major histocompatibility complex (MHC) of human and other 
vertebrates, and related proteins of the immune system (RPI) of any species 
which belong to the immunoglobulin superfamily (IgSF) and to the MHC superfamily 
(MhcSF). IMGT consists of five databases, ten on-line tools and more than 8,000 
HTML pages of Web resources. IMGT provides a common access to standardized data 
from genome, genetics, proteome and three-dimensional structures. The accuracy 
and the consistency of IMGT data are based on IMGT-ONTOLOGY, a semantic 
specification of terms to be used in immunogenetics and immunoinformatics. 
IMGT-ONTOLOGY comprises six main concepts: IDENTIFICATION, CLASSIFICATION, 
DESCRIPTION, NUMEROTATION, ORIENTATION and OBTENTION. Based on these concepts, 
the controlled vocabulary and the annotation rules necessary for the 
immunogenetics data identification, classification, description and numbering 
and for the management of IMGT knowledge are defined in the IMGT Scientific 
chart. IMGT is the international reference in immunogenetics and 
immunoinformatics for medical research (repertoire analysis of the IG antibody 
sites and of the TR recognition sites in autoimmune and infectious diseases, 
AIDS, leukemias, lymphomas, myelomas), veterinary research (IG and TR 
repertoires in farm and wild life species), genome diversity and genome 
evolution studies of the adaptive immune responses, biotechnology related to 
antibody engineering (single chain Fragment variable (scFv), phage displays, 
combinatorial libraries, chimeric, humanized and human antibodies), diagnostics 
(detection and follow up of residual diseases) and therapeutical approaches 
(grafts, immunotherapy, vaccinology). IMGT is freely available at 
http://imgt.cines.fr.