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. 1982 Dec;38(3):1130–1136. doi: 10.1128/iai.38.3.1130-1136.1982

Effect of neonatal thymectomy on dental caries in rats.

J L Ebersole, M A Taubman, D J Smith
PMCID: PMC347867  PMID: 6984017

Abstract

The effect of T-cell depletion on susceptibility to dental caries after infection with Streptococcus mutans was studied. Rats were neonatally thymectomized (Tx) and infected with S. mutans 6715 or locally immunized with the homologous organism before infection. The Tx rats uniformly exhibited a higher level of infection with S. mutans and subsequently showed a greater extent of carious activity. Correlation studies were performed comparing the level of salivary and serum anti-S. mutans antibodies and the relative amount of dental caries. The results demonstrated that salivary immunoglobulin A antibody after immunization and infection, or infection only, showed a significant negative correlation with dental caries. Also, after local immunization, serum immunoglobulin G antibody showed a negative correlation with dental caries in the rats. These findings further support a major protective role for salivary immunoglobulin A in experimental dental caries in rats.

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Selected References

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

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