Role of adhesion molecules in chronic allograft rejection

Endothelial adhesion molecules play an important role in T cell recruitment to an allograft site. Therefore, it could be expected that their blocking may be beneficial for allograft survival. In this report, we show that T cells from patients with chronic rejection have an up-regulated ability to adhere to inflamed endothelium in vitro. Furthermore, this enhanced T cell: endothelial interaction could be blocked by anti-VCAM and anti-E-selectin monoclonal antibodies.