Abstract
SummaryWhile the immunological competence of recirculating, small lymphocytes in the thoracic duct lymph is well documented, there is no unequivocal evidence that these are the cells which mediate the rejection of first‐set allografts in vivo. This evidence was sought by assaying the capacity of thoracic duct lymphocytes from normal donors to adoptively restore primary skin allograft responses to recipients in which these responses had been suppressed by irradiation. It was found that 30 million thoracic duct lymphocytes were sufficient to restore rejection of allogeneic skin with a normal first‐set tempo. The cell type responsible was identified as the recirculating small lymphocyte by showing that those cells which migrated from blood to lymph in heavily irradiated syngeneic rats were equally competent to restore first‐set allograft responses. The specificity of this restoration was shown using thoracic duct lymphocytes from tolerant donors which restored activity against third party allo‐antigens but not against antigens of the strain to which the donor was tolerant. These results establish that recirculating small lymphocytes mediate the destruction of first‐set allografted tissue in vivo.
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