Tolerance maintenance depends on persistence of the tolerizing antigen: evidence from transplantation studies on Xenopus laevis.

In order to assess the role of antigen persistence in the tolerant state, tolerance was induced in Xenopus laevis by the embryonic transplantation of whole eyes or tail tissue. Both types of transplants were seen to heal in and persist, with no signs of immunological incompatibility. At metamorphosis, tail resorption occurred and grafted tail tissue was lost. Eye transplants were maintained through metamorphosis in most eye grafted animals. Eye graft recipients which had maintained the transplant were observed to accept challenge skin allografts from donors of the same genotype as the eye donor in all but one case, while recipients which had lost the eye transplant at metamorphosis or had the eye transplant experimentally removed sometimes did not accept the challenge skin graft. Animals tail grafted as embryos did not accept post metamorphic skin grafts from donors of the same genotype as the tail tissue donor, but rejection was not accelerated. It is proposed that tolerance induction is dependent on the presence of appropriately presented antigen at a time when precursor thymocyte cells are migrating to the thymus, prior to their processing into alloreactive cells, and that tolerance maintenance is dependent upon the persistence of the tolerizing antigen.