Skip to main content
NCBI home page
The Journal of Experimental Medicine logoLink to The Journal of Experimental Medicine
. 1976 Aug 1;144(2):456–466. doi: 10.1084/jem.144.2.456

T-Lymphocyte precursors. I. Synergy between precursor and mature T lymphocytes in the response to concanavalin A

PMCID: PMC2190392  PMID: 1085329

Abstract

When mouse bone marrow cells are mixed with cortisol-resistant thymocytes and stimulated in vitro with concanavalin A, the mitogenic response observed is much greater than additive, that is, it is synergistic. Between 94 and 96% of responding cells could be identified as T cells (Thy-1 positive) and of these, 79-100% derived from the cortisol-resistant thymocyte population, not from the bone marrow. Purified macrophages could not replace bone marrow; and marrow depleted of mature T or B cells worked as well as normal marrow. Thus, T and B cells and macrophages were ruled out as the synergizing cell of bone marrow. Nude spleen contained 10 times as many precursors of T cells as did nude marrow and was 10 times better at synergy with cortisol- resistant thymocytes. This implication of the pre-T cell as synergizer was supported by the finding that the synergistic activity of marrow was lost on preincubation, but maintained if the preincubation medium contained thymosin or cyclic AMP. Thus, the ability to enhance the response of relatively mature T cells to Con A is a property of pre-T cells. It is anticipated that this property will allow more detailed studies of T-cell precursor development in mice, and possibly in man.

Full Text

The Full Text of this article is available as a PDF (789.1 KB).

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Cantor L. N., Morris A. J., Marks P. A., Rifkind R. A. Purification of erythropoietin-responsive cells by immune hemolysis. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1972 Jun;69(6):1337–1341. doi: 10.1073/pnas.69.6.1337. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Cohen J. J., Patterson C. K. Induction of theta-positive lymphocytes and lymphoblasts in mouse bone marrow by mitogens. J Immunol. 1975 Jan;114(1 Pt 2):374–376. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Coppleson L. W., Michie D. A quantitative study of the chorioallantoic membrane reaction in the chick embryo. Proc R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 1966 Jan 18;163(993):555–563. doi: 10.1098/rspb.1966.0009. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Delespesse G., Duchateau J., Gausset P., Govaerts A. In vitro response of subpopulations of human tonsil lymphocytes. I. Cellular collaboration in the proliferative response to PHA and Con A. J Immunol. 1976 Feb;116(2):437–445. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Goldstein A. L., Slater F. D., White A. Preparation, assay, and partial purification of a thymic lymphocytopoietic factor (thymosin). Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1966 Sep;56(3):1010–1017. doi: 10.1073/pnas.56.3.1010. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. Julius M. H., Simpson E., Herzenberg L. A. A rapid method for the isolation of functional thymus-derived murine lymphocytes. Eur J Immunol. 1973 Oct;3(10):645–649. doi: 10.1002/eji.1830031011. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. Komuro K., Boyse E. A. In-vitro demonstration of thymic hormone in the mouse by conversion of precursor cells into lymphocytes. Lancet. 1973 Apr 7;1(7806):740–743. doi: 10.1016/s0140-6736(73)92127-2. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. Levis W. R., Robbins J. H. Effect of glass-adherent cells on the blastogenic response of 'purified' lymphocytes to phytohemagglutinin. Exp Cell Res. 1970 Jul;61(1):153–158. doi: 10.1016/0014-4827(70)90269-7. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. Lipsky P. E., Ellner J. J., Rosenthal A. L. Phytohemagglutinin-induced proliferation of guinea pig thymus-derived lymphocytes. I. Accessory cell dependence. J Immunol. 1976 Mar;116(3):868–875. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. Mosier D. E. A requirement for two cell types for antibody formation in vitro. Science. 1967 Dec 22;158(3808):1573–1575. doi: 10.1126/science.158.3808.1573. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  11. Niederhuber J. E., Frelinger J. A., Dine M. S., Shoffner P., Dugan E., Shreffler D. C. Effects of anti-Ia sera on mitogenic responses. II. Differential expression of the Ia marker on phytohemagglutinin and concanavalin A-reactive T cells. J Exp Med. 1976 Feb 1;143(2):372–381. doi: 10.1084/jem.143.2.372. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  12. Scheid M. P., Hoffmann M. K., Komuro K., Hämmerling U., Abbott J., Boyse E. A., Cohen G. H., Hooper J. A., Schulof R. S., Goldstein A. L. Differentiation of T cells induced by preparations from thymus and by nonthymic agents. J Exp Med. 1973 Oct 1;138(4):1027–1032. doi: 10.1084/jem.138.4.1027. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  13. Sheppard H., Wiggan G. Analogues of 4-(3,4-dimethoxybenzyl)-2-imidazolidinone as potent inhibitors of rat erythrocyte adenosine cyclic 3',5'-phosphate phosphodiesterase. Mol Pharmacol. 1971 Jan;7(1):111–115. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  14. Tridente G., Biasi G., Chieco-Bianchi L., Fiore-Donati L. Thymus-marrow cell interaction evaluated by PHA stimulation and graft versus host activity. Nature. 1971 Nov 12;234(5324):105–106. doi: 10.1038/234105a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  15. Wigzell H., Sundqvist K. G., Yoshida T. O. Separation of cells according to surface antigens by the use of antibody-coated columns. Fractionation of cells carrying immunoglobulins and blood group antigen. Scand J Immunol. 1972;1(1):75–87. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-3083.1972.tb03737.x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from The Journal of Experimental Medicine are provided here courtesy of The Rockefeller University Press

RESOURCES