Lymphocytopoiesis, Plasmacytopoiesis and Cellular Proliferation in Nonantigenically Stimulated Germfree Mice

Abstract

Summary Quantitative evaluation of lymphocytopoiesis and plasmacytopoiesis in various lymph nodes of germfree and conv mice show the conv animals have about 3 times (% basis) or 12 times (absolute basis determined from mesenteric lymph nodes) more blast and potential antibody producing cells than their germfree counterparts. Other cellular aspects such as cell distribution within respective lymph nodes and proliferation rate of lymphoid cells are not affected by the animal's germfree status. Two hours after tritiated thymidine (TH3) pulse labelling, the nodes of the conv mice contained more labelled cells per 1000 cells than the respective nodes of germfree mice. Evidence suggests this difference was due to a smaller quantity of less differentiated cells and to a restriction of TH3 label movement in nodes of germfree mice. Cells which became labelled incorporated the TH3 to the same extent in both germfree and conv mice.