Studies on B-cell memory. II. T-cell independent antigen can induce B-cell memory.

Both athymic nude mice and normal mice primed with a T-cell independent antigen, i.e. dinitrophenylated dextran (DNP-DE), at a sub-immunogenic dose, produced very poor anti-DNP responses to a later challenge with the same antigen. B-cell memory was expressed, however, as an enhanced IgM response after the challenge of the DNP-DE-primed mice with the T-cell dependent antigen (dinitrophenylated haemocyanin, DNP-KLH) in the presence of functional T-cells. Moreover, DNP-DE-primed spleen cells also revealed an enhanced IgM response after adoptive transfer into irradiated recipients and challenge with DNP-DE. The injections of DNP-DE-primed nude mouse serum into unprimed mice resulted in the reduction of anti-DNP response to the immunization with DNP-DE. These results indicate that (a) T-cell independent DNP-DE causes the differentiation of B cells not only into antibody-forming cells but also into memory cells, (b) these memory cells can be triggered in situ by the T-cell dependent DNP-KLH in the presence of helper T cells but not by T-cell independent antigen, and (c) some humoral factor(s) induced by DNP-DE-priming seems to interfere with the expression of B-cell memory only when challenged with T-cell independent DNP-DE.