Antigen-induced inhibition of autoimmune response to rat male accessory glands. Role of macrophages in the induction of suppressor cells.

The present paper describes a mechanism responsible for the induction of inducer-phase suppressor cells effective to suppress the autoimmune response to rat male accessory glands (RAG). In fact, we reported here that marked suppression of delayed type hypersensitivity (DTH) reaction and humoral response to chemically modified rat male accessory glands (MRAG) can be obtained when previously to be immunized with MRAG in complete Freund's adjuvant (CFA) syngeneic rats were pretreated with peritoneal cells (PC) coupled with a purified fraction of RAG (containing the autoantigen). The involvement of MRAG-specific inducer-phase suppressor cells was demonstrated by adoptive transfer experiments of spleen mononuclear cells from unresponsive donors to normal syngeneic rats 24 h prior to immunization of the recipients with MRAG-CFA. The PC used to treat the animals show a large proportion of non-specific-esterase positive, Ox-41 bearing macrophage-like cells. Moreover, the antigen-coupled PC able to trigger the suppressor cells showed the presence of the autoantigen of RAG on their surface. The role of the antigen presenting cells in the induction of MRAG-specific inducer-phase suppressor cells is discussed.