title: Rat T lymphocyte-specific antigens and their cross-reactivity with mouse T cells.
abstract: Anti-rat T lymphocyte serum (ATLS)2 was prepared by immunizing rabbits with purified T cells from rat mesenteric nodes and absorbed with rat red cells and syngeneic sarcoma cells. The specificity of ATLS for rat T cells was confirmed by the following reasons: a) ATLS was not toxic for bone marrow cells but lysed most of the thymocytes and a number of spleen and lymph node cells, which were inversely correlated to the percentage of cells with B cell characteristics in respective organs; b) anatomical localization of ATLS-reactive cells in lymphoid organs coincided to the thymus-dependent areas, i.e. the paracortex of lymph node and the periarteriolar region of spleen; c) spleen cells treated with ATLS and complement failed to respond to phytohemagglutinin but normally responded to bacterial lipopolysaccharide; d) those cells treated with ATLS and complement could not induce a graft-vs-host reaction in F1 hosts, whereas the same treatment did not affect direct plaque-forming cells. All of these data confirm the specificity of ATLS and indicate that ATLS recognizes rat T lymphocyte-specific antigens (RTLA). Absorption studies showed that RTLA were present in higher concentration on medullary thymocytes and peripheral T cells than on cortical thymocytes, but absent from bone marrow, liver, and brain tissues. When the cross-reactivity of RTLA with mouse T cells was studied by C-dependent cytotoxicity and immunofluorescence, it was found that mouse T cells shared at least one determinant of RTLA with rat T cells, and that distribution pattern of the cross-reacting antigens in mouse lymphoid tissues was essentially the same as that of RTLA in rat lymphoid organs.
mesh_terms: D000042:Absorption; D000818:Animals; D000941:Antigens; D000961:Antilymphocyte Serum; D001402:B-Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology; D003429:Cross Reactions; D008198:Lymph Nodes / Q000166:cytology; D008213:Lymphocyte Activation; D051379:Mice; D008806:Mice, Inbred AKR; D008809:Mice, Inbred C3H; D051381:Rats; D011919:Rats, Inbred Strains; D013045:Species Specificity; D013601:T-Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology*
chemical_list: D000941:Antigens; D000961:Antilymphocyte Serum