Figure 8.
Effect of Bcl-2 overexpression on SpA-induced B cell deletion. The outcome of in vivo treatments with SpA or a control protein are depicted for Bcl-2 transgenic (TgN(Bcl-2)22) and BALB/c mice. When evaluated ex vivo, 16 h after treatment, SpA exposure greatly decreases the representation of detectable SpA-reactive B cells in either strain of mice. After subsequent in vitro culture, SpA exposure results in the deletion of most of the SpA-reactive BALB/c B cells whereas comparable deletion does not occur in the Bcl-2 transgenic B cells. Analyses were performed on groups of OVA-treated BALB/c mice (n = 5), SpA-treated BALB/c mice (n = 6), OVA-treated Bcl-2 transgenic mice (n = 5), and SpA-treated Bcl-2 transgenic mice (n = 4).