Hanna M G, Peters L C
Immunology. 1971 May;20(5):707-18.
The concept that antigen has a continuous role in the recruitment and differentiation of immune progenitor cells was tested with optimum and suboptimum doses of heterologous erythrocytes in mice. These studies further evaluated an immune cell maturation scheme in which continuous antigenic stimulation is required for both the recruitment of `antigen-sensitive units' and the expansive proliferation of a distinct sensitized cell compartment, which undergoes irreversible differentiation to functional antibody-forming cells. Haemolytic plaque-forming cell capacity during both the primary and secondary immune reactions were studied, both in the intact animal and with the spleen cell transfer technique. This culture technique was used to measure the sensitized cell compartment in the absence of existing antibody regulatory mechanisms. The results clearly demonstrate a higher detectable secondary immune capacity in the suboptimum antigen dose group than in the optimum antigen dose group. This was demonstrated for both the 19S and 7S cellular responses, as well as with humoral antibody levels measured in the spleen cell recipient mice. It can be concluded that in the presence of a suboptimum dose of antigen, which rapidly diminishes during the early intervals of the primary response, there is adequate recruitment with subsequent preservation or rescue from antigen-mediated depletion of the sensitized cell compartment, at the expense of the detectable primary response.
在小鼠中，用最佳剂量和次最佳剂量的异源红细胞测试了抗原在免疫祖细胞募集和分化中具有持续作用这一概念。这些研究进一步评估了一种免疫细胞成熟模式，其中持续的抗原刺激对于“抗原敏感单位”的募集以及一个独特的致敏细胞区室的扩增增殖都是必需的，该致敏细胞区室会不可逆地分化为功能性抗体形成细胞。在完整动物体内以及采用脾细胞转移技术，研究了初次和二次免疫反应期间溶血空斑形成细胞的能力。这种培养技术用于在不存在现有抗体调节机制的情况下测量致敏细胞区室。结果清楚地表明，次最佳抗原剂量组的可检测二次免疫能力高于最佳抗原剂量组。这在19S和7S细胞反应以及脾细胞受体小鼠中测得的体液抗体水平方面均得到了证实。可以得出结论，在存在次最佳剂量抗原的情况下，抗原在初次反应的早期阶段会迅速减少，此时会有足够的募集，随后致敏细胞区室得以保存或从抗原介导的耗竭中挽救出来，代价是可检测到的初次反应减弱。
