title: The immune response to corneal allograft requires a site-specific draining lymph node.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Recent studies have shown that head-neck draining lymph nodes (DLN) are required for priming the immune response during corneal allograft rejection. In this study we have investigated further the role of the DLN and spleen in corneal graft rejection in mice.
  
  
  METHODS
  Individual DLN (submandibular [SM]; superficial cervical [SC]; and internal jugular) or their combinations were removed in mice undergoing corneal allografting (C57BL/10, H2(b) to BALB/c, H2(d)). In some mice, DLN from syngeneic mice were retransplanted, whereas other mice underwent removal of the spleen before corneal allografting. In a high-risk group of mice, removal of the DLN before a second corneal graft procedure was performed.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The data show that a single specific lymph node, i.e., the SM node, is the major DLN involved in corneal graft rejection whereas its nearest neighbor, the SC DLN, not only cannot substitute for the SM node in priming the immune response but may be involved with the spleen in immune privilege. Retransplantation studies of syngeneic LN indicate that the site of the DLN is more important to the process of graft rejection than the specific DLN tissue. This applies to the DLN whether it contains naive or memory allospecific T cells as shown in experiments in which removal of the SM DLN from mice who had already been primed by a previous corneal graft, prevented rejection of a second corneal graft in the same strain combination.
authors.affiliation: Department of Ophthalmology, University of Aberdeen, Medical School Foresterhill, Aberdeen, AB25 2ZD, Scotland, UK.
authors.forename: Jarmila
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Plsková
authors.forename: Linda
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Duncan
authors.forename: Vladimír
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Holán
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Filipec
authors.forename: Georg
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Kraal
authors.forename: John V
authors.initials: JV
authors.lastname: Forrester
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D016039:Corneal Transplantation / Q000276:immunology*; D004322:Drainage; D005260:Female; D005434:Flow Cytometry; D006084:Graft Rejection; D008198:Lymph Nodes / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D012038:Regeneration; D013997:Time Factors; D014184:Transplantation, Homologous