Hormones and the immunological capacity. IV. Restorative effects of developmental hormones or of lymphocytes on the immunodeficiency syndrome of the dwarf mouse

Abstract

The restorative action of developmental hormones, mainly somatotropic hormone, and of lymphnode lymphocytes on the immunologically crippled hypopituitary Snell-Bagg dwarf mouse is evaluated. The hormonal treatment can completely reconstitute the structure of the thymus and of the peripheral lymphoid tissues. Both hormones and mature lymphocytes restore the impaired capacity of the dwarf mouse to propuce antibody and to reject skin allografts. Normal donor thymocytes and bone marrow cells alone or in combination fail to produce the same effect in absence of a hormonal treatment. The action of hormones is not exerted if dwarf mice are thymectomized in adult age. This and other evidence shows that the action of hormones is mediated through the thymus and leads to the formation of long-living lymphocytes.