title: Epitope-specific regulation of the antibody response against alpha-lactalbumins in the mouse.
abstract: The immune responsiveness to human and bovine alpha-lactalbumin (HuALA and BoALA) was found to be under the control of immune response (Ir) gene(s) linked to the major histocompatibility complex. H-2k mice responded to both HuALA and BoALA, whereas H-2d,s,and f mice respond only to HuALA; H-2b mice were nonresponders to both HuALA and BoALA. A survey with B10.A recombinant mouse strains enabled us to map the Ir gene in the I-A subregion. The responsiveness was shown to be dominant in F1 mice. The coimmunization of BoALA and HuALA resulted in the suppressed secondary antibody response to HuALA in B10.S (H-2s) and BALB/c (H-2d) but not in C3H (H-2k) suggesting that the low responsiveness against HuALA in these strains is due to an active suppression. The transfer of splenic T cells of B10.S mice primed with BoALA into syngeneic animals suppressed the response to HuALA. T cells specific for a particular epitope present on BoALA appeared to suppress the immune response to other epitopes on HuALA. Thus, the presence of epitope-specific suppressor T cells seems to account for this Ir-gene-controlled low responsiveness to ALA in H-2s mice.
authors.affiliation: Department of Immunology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Horiuchi
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yagi
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Asano
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Tada
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D000917:Antibody Formation; D002417:Cattle; D003429:Cross Reactions; D000939:Epitopes; D005802:Genes, MHC Class II; D006801:Humans; D007114:Immunization; D016219:Immunotherapy, Adoptive; D007768:Lactalbumin / Q000276:immunology*; D051379:Mice; D008815:Mice, Inbred Strains; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D013601:T-Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology
chemical_list: D000939:Epitopes; D007768:Lactalbumin