Polyclonal origin of rheumatoid synovial T-lymphocytes.

Nineteen T-cell clones from seven patients with RA were obtained by cloning infiltrating lymphocytes from needle synovial biopsies. Southern blot analysis of the T-cell receptor (TCR) beta-chain genes in these clones revealed that there were no T-cell clones with an identical rearrangement of the TCR beta gene. These results do not support the idea that the infiltrating T-lymphocytes in RA are of monoclonal or oligoclonal origin.