Modification of acute murine cytomegalovirus adrenal gland infection by adoptive spleen cell transfer.

Homozygous (nu/nu), athymic nude mice, infected with murine cytomegalovirus (MCMV), develop unremitting and ablative virus infection involving both the adrenal cortex and medulla. During acute infection, adoptive transfer of MCMV-immune, but not naive, spleen cells suppressed virus replication in the adrenal glands, but not the lungs or salivary gland. T lymphocytes, not macrophages or B cells, were responsible for limiting viral replication. The effect by donor cells was restricted by compatibility at the major histocompatibility locus. Restriction of MCMV replication in the adrenal gland was associated with T lymphocytes of the L3T4 phenotype. Thus, T-cell immunity is critical in regulating MCMV replication in the adrenal glands, and T lymphocytes restricted by class II major histocompatibility antigens mediate this effect.