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Bone marrow aplasia induced by passenger leukocytes from heart allografts
1Klinik für Viszeral- und Transplantationschirurgie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover, Hannover, Germany.
Objective:
Organ allografts contain passenger leukocytes that are transferred to the recipient with the transplantation, but their functional relevance to the recipient's immune system is still controversial.
Materials And Methods:
To clarify the functional capacity of passenger leukocytes, we attempted to enhance their effect in rat heart allograft recipients by selective depletion of recipient leukocytes using a monoclonal antibody (mAb) against a recipient-specific allotype of CD45 (RT7(a)).
Results:
Although antibody treatment of the recipient alone led to profound lymphopenia and reversible myelosuppression, additional transplantation of an major histocompatibility complex-incompatible heart graft from an RT7(b) donor led to lethal aplastic anemia in the recipients. This lethal effect was completely abrogated by postoperative anti-CD3 treatment of the recipient and was partially abrogated or delayed by depletion of passenger leukocytes through additional anti-RT7(b) antibody treatment of the recipient or gamma-irradiation of the graft.
Conclusions:
The results suggest a role for both donor and recipient-type T cells for the induction of aplastic anemia in this model. The study shows that, under defined conditions, allogeneic passenger leukocytes in a heart graft can have a profound effect on the recipient's immune system and bone marrow.