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Maintenance of Peritoneal B-1a Lymphocytes in the Absence of the Spleen¹

Karsten Kretschmer^2,*, Jana Stopkowicz^*, Stephan Scheffer, Tim F. Greten and Siegfried Weiss^*

^* Molecular Immunology, Gesellschaft für Biotechnologische Forschung, German Research Centre for Biotechnology, Braunschweig, Germany; and Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Endocrinology, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover, Hannover, Germany

Positive selection by autoantigens is believed to play an important role in the generation/maintenance of B-1a cells. Recently, it has been described that splenectomy results in the loss of an already established B-1a cell pool. To elucidate whether the spleen influences the peritoneal B-1a repertoire, we have analyzed the consequences of splenectomy in the recently established IgL-transgenic L2 mouse model. L2 mice are characterized by a severe block of B-2 development and predominance of B-1a cells, which exhibit a pronounced IgH oligoclonality, presumably due to positive selection by autoantigens. In this study, we show that, in striking contrast to splenectomized normal mice, L2 mice exhibit unchanged frequencies of peritoneal B-1a cells. The IgH repertoire of these B-1a cells, however, was severely perturbed in that the previously described predominant B-1a H chains were no longer present. The repertoire changes were partial since phosphatidylcholine-specific B-1a cells were present in similar numbers before and after splenectomy. Thus, splenic Ags appear to act as "survival factors" for major subsets of peritoneal B cells. The loss of B-1a cells in the absence of such factors is compensated by repertoire changes among B-1a cells in B cell lymphopenic L2 but not normal mice.

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