Fresh and predegenerate nerve allografts and isografts in trembler mice

In order to investigate whether Schwann cell or myelin was the principal antigen responsible for nerve graft rejection, fresh nerve grafts and those in which myelin had been previously allowed to degenerate (predegenerate grafts) from both isogeneic BALB/c and allogeneic C57/B1 mice were inserted into trembler BALB/c mice. Schwann cells within nerve allografts from C57/B1 mice were rejected, whether or not the grafts contained myelin. Nerve isografts from normal BALB/c animals produced normally myelinated trembler axons within the grafted segments, and across these segments conduction velocity was restored towards the normal value. It is concluded that Schwann cells, not myelin, constitute the principal antigen within nerve allografts and it is Schwann-cell rejection that limits the successful use of nerve allografts.