Peripheral T cells in diabetes prone (DP) BB rats are CD45R-negative.

Diabetes prone BB (DP BB) rats are known to develop insulin dependent diabetes mellitus. In addition, a number of other immune abnormalities have been observed, like severe T lymphopenia, lack of CD8+ T cells, and lack of RT6+ T cells. Here we report double-labelling studies of lymph node T cells using MRC OX-32 (CD45R), and demonstrate that this T cell subset is absent in young adult DP BB rats. Since both RT6 and MRC OX-32 antigens are only expressed by mature peripheral T cells, it is tempting to speculate that the peripheral T cell pool of DP BB rats consists only of immature peripheral T cells, i.e. recent thymic emigrants.