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The HLA-DQ antigen here is on the surface of a macrophage.  Its job is to  present ‘digested’ peptides to T-cells to initiate an immune response.  Different DQ antigens have different clefts and, therefore, may present only certain peptides to T-cells, or may present them in a manner that can impact the strength of the immune response that is subsequently generated.  Thus, the differences in DNA sequence in DQA1 and DQB1 alleles impacts the function of the molecule.