Kantele A
National Public Health Institute, Helsinki, Finland.
Scand J Immunol. 1991 Feb;33(2):225-9. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-3083.1991.tb03753.x.
The influence of prolonged intestinal antigen exposure on the immune response in humans was investigated. Two groups of volunteers were vaccinated orally with live Salmonella typhi Ty21a given in enteric-coated capsules three (group 3 x E) or six (group 6 x E) at 2-day intervals. The immune response was followed for 1 month by enumerating the antibody-secreting cells (ASC) in the peripheral blood. Soon after vaccination specific ASC were observed in the blood of all volunteers. In group 3 x E, the response peaked on day 5 or 7 and had faded away by day 14. In group 6 x E, by contrast, there was no clear single peak of the response, and the ASC numbers were high in several consecutive measurements. On day 14, considerable numbers of ASC were still detected in all cases; the responses had mostly faded away by day 22. These results show that prolonged exposure to antigen in the intestine induces a prolonged response of specific ASC in peripheral blood. This is an important prerequisite for the application of the ASC assay to study mucosal infections, in which the actual time of onset is often unknown. In addition, the findings suggest that the ASC assay might offer new possibilities for assessing the persistence of microbial antigens in infections.
研究了长期肠道抗原暴露对人体免疫反应的影响。两组志愿者口服肠溶胶囊剂型的活伤寒沙门氏菌Ty21a进行疫苗接种，接种剂量为每2天一次，3次（3xE组）或6次（6xE组）。通过计数外周血中抗体分泌细胞（ASC）来跟踪免疫反应1个月。接种疫苗后不久，所有志愿者血液中均观察到特异性ASC。在3xE组中，反应在第5天或第7天达到峰值，并在第14天消失。相比之下，在6xE组中，反应没有明显的单峰，并且在连续几次测量中ASC数量都很高。在第14天，所有病例中仍检测到大量ASC；到第22天，反应大多消失。这些结果表明，肠道中抗原的长期暴露会诱导外周血中特异性ASC的长期反应。这是将ASC检测应用于研究粘膜感染的重要前提条件，因为粘膜感染的实际发病时间通常是未知的。此外，研究结果表明，ASC检测可能为评估感染中微生物抗原的持续性提供新的可能性。
