Delayed mortality after mid-lethal exposures to wholebody irradiation and its modification by treatment with syngeneic lymph-node or bone-marrow cells.

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SummaryDeaths between 25 and 275 days after mid-lethal x-irradiation were closely reminiscent of the ‘secondary disease’ of supralethally irradiated mice given allogeneic or xenogeneic cells. One-third of the mice with the diarrhoea syndrome died of it; the majority recovered spontaneously.The delayed mortality was prevented and diarrhoea minimized by treatment with 107 syngeneic lymph-node cells either soon after irradiation or 22 days later. Thus death from lymphoid insufficiency is a specific consequence of whole-body irradiation by mid-lethal doses. Radiation-induced somatic mutation in surviving cells may play a part.Early treatment with 5 × 106 syngeneic bone-marrow cells was also effective. Bone marrow at 22 days had less effect on diarrhoea and did not decrease mortality but changed the post-mortem findings, death occurring characteristically with markedly congested lungs and with amyloid deposits in spleen and liver.Body weight was increased but not restored to normal by treatment with either kin...