Autoimmune oophoritis in thymectomized mice: T cell requirement in adoptive cell transfer

Experimental autoimmune oophoritis characterized by rapid loss of oocytes with infiltration of lymphocytes and circulating anti-oocyte antibodies could be induced in (C57Bl/6Cr x A/JCr)F1 mice after thymectomy (Tx) at a critical age of 3 days (Tx-3) but not 0. or 7 days after birth without any sensitization. The lesion of the ovary was passively transferred into neonatal, but not adult, mice 7 days after intraperitoneal (i.p.) injection of spleen cells (10(7)) obtained from syngeneic donors with oophoritis. In contrast, the lesion was never evoked in the recipient ovaries when spleen cells were prepared from Tx-3 mice ovariectomized at day 0. The spleen cells prepared from Tx-3 donors, depleted of T cells by incubation with anti-Thy 1.2 antiserum plus guinea-pig complement (GPC), showed no transfer capacity. However, the spleen cells prepared from the same donors, depleted of B cells with anti-Ig antiserum plus GPC, still kept the capacity to induce oophoritis. The results indicate the presence of autoreactive T cells against ovarian tissues in Tx-3 mice which are capable of inducing oophoritis.