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objections to the local environment hypothesisA carrier effect is obtained typically when a hapten-protein conjugate is injected into an animal which has previously been primed with the same hapten conjugated to another carrier protein. Under these circumstances the antihapten secondary response is usually less than that which would have been obtained had the animal been injected with a conjugate prepared with the same carrier as that originally used for priming. Attempts have been made to account for the phenomenon in terms of the local environment hypothesis, which assumes that the receptor on immunologically competent cells recognises the hapten jointly with the area on the complete antigen which surrounds it. Alternatively the phenomenon can be accounted for by the hypothesis of cooperation, which assumes that the antigen is recognised by two receptors, one directed to the hapten and the other to a determinant on the carrier protein.Methods are described which enable carrier effects to be studied quantitatively