Cellular changes in the intestinal lymph of sheep infected with the enteric nematode, Trichostrongylus colubriformis.

Some changes produced in the cell populations of intestinal lymph by infection with the enteric nematode, Trichostrongylus colubriformis, were studied in sheep regularly re-infused with all discharged lymph. Lymphocyte traffic through the intestinal lymphatic duct was reduced until day 35 of primary infection, mainly due to the absence of lymphocytes with smaller cell volumes, but was increased two-fold after day 70 and in immune sheep. Antigen-reactive lymphocytes in blood and lymph were assayed by the uptake of 3H-thymidine in cell culture stimulated by extracts from the larvae of T. colubriformis. Cells from the blood and lymph of immune sheep were highly reactive to worm antigen. A relatively smaller reactivity was present in the blood of worm-free sheep and was abolished during the first 12 days of primary infection. Antigen reactive cells were not detected in intestinal lymph until 12 days after primary infection, and in vitro antigen reactivity in intestinal lymph of immune sheep was increased after challenge with infective larvae. Responses to the mitogens, concanvalin A and phytohaemagglutinin, in cultures of cells from both intestinal lymph and blood were depressed on days 7 and 12 of primary infection. It is proposed that the diminished traffic of lymphocytes in intestinal lymph and the reduced numbers of mitogen and nematode antigen-reactive lymphocytes in both blood and intestinal lymph during the early stages of infection with T. colubriformis is closely related to the slow development of protective immunity to this parasite.