부산대학교 도서관

The ability of interleukin 2 (IL 2) to stimulate cellular division of activated T lymphocytes allows us to propagate “in vitro” from the minute fragments of the biopsies the T cells infiltrating the inflammatory tissue. Previous studies on human allograft rejection (1), rheumatoid arthritis (2) and lung cancer (3) suggest that a high percentage of lymphocytes reactive against specific antigens should be present in the infiltrated small bowel mucosa of patients with gluten enteropathy. Therefore we developed a system that allows us to propagate relevant amounts of activated T lymphocytes from minute fragments of per oral small bowel biopsies performed for diagnostic purposes. In preliminary experiments on two different patients with gluten enteropathy, in challenge with gluten containing diet, the culture of bioptic tissue in presence of IL-2 allowed us to recover as many as 10 lymphocytes. The evaluation of surface markers with monoclonal antibodies showed that these cells were virtually all T lymphocytes (CD3+): the two different T cells subsets, helper/inducer (CD4+) and suppressor/ cytotoxic (CD8+) were in both patients almost equally represented. On the other hand in three other patients, one with coeliac disease in gluten free diet, one with asymptomatic coeliac disease, identified during a family study, and one with food allergy, the culture of bioptic fragments in presence of IL-2 failed to produce a substantial lymphocytes' proliferation. The ability of IL-2 to expand lymphocytes infiltrating small bowel mucosa in patients with active coeliac disease could allow us to obtain relevant numbers of cells that can be used for functional assays.1) Stegagno M, et Al. Transplantation Proceedings 1987, XIX, 394.2) Stamenkovic I, et Al. PNAS in press.3) Kurnick JT, et Al. Clin Immunol Immunopathol 1986, 38, 367.