No abstract

Spleen cells of female C57BL/6 mice, preimmunized to male histocompatibility antigen, elicited splenomegaly in adult male recipients and caused mortality of the newborn recipients. These cells, upon restimulation in vitro with the male antigen, were cytotoxic to male target cells.

Splenomegaly was strong in the degree and continued for a long period of time in adult F1 hybrids between AKR (H-2^k) and C3H/He (H-2^k) mice after transfer of spleen cells from normal C3H/He mice. In spleen cells of such F1 recipients, cytotoxicity was detected by an in vivo neutralization test using methylcholanthrene-induced sarcoma of AKR origin as target cells. All of newborn F1 recipients died within 17 days after cell transfer. Induction of splenomegaly and cytotoxicity was not prevented by repeated pre-treatments of donors with sonicated AKR spleen cells in saline, which suppressed completely such phenomena of graft-versus-host reaction in an H-2 nonidentical combination. Induction of cytotoxicity in the spleen of F1 recipients was not prevented by a pretreatment of donors with AKR spleen cells in complete Freund’s adjuvant, which suppressed the induction of cytotoxicity in an H-2 nonidentical combination. Graft-versus-host reaction appears to be stronger in a combination between parental strains of which major histocompatibility antigens were identical.

Abstract]Twenty-two children underwent splenectomy for congenital spherocytosis or chronic thrombocytopenia. The splenectomized patients have been recognized to be susceptible to severe infections. The patients were studied immunologically one week before operation, three times during the first postoperative month, two months, one and two years later.

[Summary] Granulocyte functions were studied in a case of Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome. In the agarose plate, granulocytes of this patient were shown to have moderately decreased responses in chemotaxis induced by N-formyl-methionyl-leucyl-phenylalanine (FMLP) and zymosanactivated human serum (ZAS), whereas they were shown to have a normal capacity of random migration. Phagocytosis and superoxide production by neutrophils were within normal limits.Chemotaxis of neutrophils in this patient was improved by transfer factor therapy. Clinical improvement of patients with Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome treated by transfer factor may be due to recovery of granulocyte functions.