Studies on the Development of Tuberculin Sensitivity in Immunized Guinea Pigs with Demonstration of a Close Relationship between Results of Skin Tests and the Lymphocyte Transformation Technique

Abstract

The development of tuberculin sensitivity in groups of guinea pigs immunized with living BCG vaccine or with heat-killed Mycobacterium tuberculosis suspended in oil (TB) was measured by skin tests and lymphocyte transformation (LT) tests with tuberculin PPD. LT tests on lymphocytes from peripheral blood (PBL) and lymph nodes (LNL) and skin tests were carried out on different groups of guinea pigs for 1 year following immunization. Three ways of expressing the LT results were considered, i.e. as stimulation index, iΔcpm and uncorrected cpm values. Since neither of the first two methods were equally applicable to all of the data, we decided to express the data as geometric means of cpm values for stimulated and control cultures, respectively. For both immunogens the sensitivity measured by PBL LT and skin tests showed a closely parallel development; LNL reactivity appeared earlier and remained at a higher level than PBL reactivity. Antibody levels in the guinea pigs were measured using a radioimmunoassay technique, were found to be dependent on the immunization period and not correlated to the cellular immunity.

Animal Models of Tuberculosis Vaccine Research: An Important Component in the Fight against Tuberculosis

“…Vaccination studies naturally transmitted multidrug-resistant M. tuberculosis because of their high susceptibility to M. tuberculosis infection via the airways [73,74]. Pathological lesions that form on the inside and outside of the lungs of guinea pigs infected with M. tuberculosis have been widely studied, offering fundamental insight into pulmonary TB in guinea pigs [75,76].…”

Animal Models of Tuberculosis: Guinea Pigs

“…Lymphocyte proliferation assays and dermal reactivity were used to characterize and compare the delayedtype hypersensitivity reactions induced, and guinea pigs have continued to be useful for evaluating reagents which are used for diagnostic skin tests (Haslov et al 1984(Haslov et al , 1995Malaghini et al 2011). However, compared with other laboratory animal species, there has been limited development of immunological reagents specific for the guinea pig.…”

The Tuberculin Skin Test Increases the Responses Measured by T Cell Interferon‐Gamma Release Assays

“…The correlation between TST and an ‘ in vitro ’ assay using peripheral blood is controversial. Originally, TST was well correlated with ‘ in vitro ’ lymphoproliferation after PPD stimulation [8]. Moreover, the finding of the ESAT‐6 antigenic complex in M. tuberculosis , deleted in BCG, led to its use in LTBI diagnosis to avoid cross‐reaction with BCG‐vaccinated people, although this precaution may be unnecessary for subjects inoculated as infants tested 10 years after vaccination [9].…”