Mechanism of inducing autologous antibody formation in nephrotoxic serum nephritis

The role of the heterologous antibody fixed in the kidney was evaluated by means of transplantation of a nephritic kidney to a normal recipient in the rat. An intravenous injection of 0.5 ml of nephrotoxic serum could not induce distinct changes in the heterologous phase, but it could cause mild or moderate changes in the autologous phase. Titration of rat antibody to rabbit IgG according to passive hemagglutination test showed that rabbit IgG fixed in the transplant could induce autologous antibody formation with a similar intensity to nephrotoxic serum given intravenously, indicating that fixed antigen played the most important role in autologous antibody formation and other factors, such as the kidney-fixing rabbit IgG remained in circulation or fixed in other tissues and the gamma-globulin other than anti-kidney antibody, might be less important. It was unclear which antibody, fixed or dissociated from the transplant, played the more important role in stimulating antibody formation.