Long-term effects of neonatal estrogen treatment on mitogen responsiveness of mouse spleen lymphocytes

Neonatal female NMRI mice were given injections of olive oil (controls) or daily doses of corticosterone (10 micrograms), 17 beta-estradiol (10 micrograms), or diethylstilbestrol (DES) (0.01, 0.1, 1, or 5 micrograms) for the first 5 days after birth. The 5-micrograms dose of DES resulted in a persistently reduced in vitro mitogen response to concanavalin A or bacterial lipopolysaccharide of spleen lymphocytes from 6-, 10-, and 18-week-old or 17-month-old females. DES injections from day 6 through day 10 did not influence the later mitogen response. Treatment of ovariectomized 10-week-old females with 5 micrograms DES for 5 days resulted in a tendency to a reduced mitogen response (not statistically significant) 24 hours after the last DES injection. Four weeks later, the mitogen response was the same in experimental and control females. Different possible mechanisms for the persistent effect on the mitogen response are discussed. Neonatal DES treatment not only resulted in persistent changes in the cervicovaginal epithelium and in the hypothalamic-pituitary gland control system but also in the spleen lymphocyte mitogen response. The altered mitogen response should be a stimulus for a detailed analysis of the immune system in women exposed to DES during fetal life, some of whom develop later in life clear cell adenocarcinoma of the uterine cervix and vagina.