Immunological status of isolated lymphoid follicles after intestinal transplantation.

MEIER DOMINIK; DOCENA GUILLERMO; RAMISCH DIEGO; TOSCANINI ULISES; BERARDI G; GONDOLESI GABRIEL; RUMBO MARTÍN

AMERICAN JOURNAL OF TRANSPLANTATION

WILEY-BLACKWELL PUBLISHING, INC

Lugar: Londres; Año: 2014 vol. 14 p. 2148 - 2158

1600-6135

Intestinal transplantation (ITx) faces the challenge ofgraft ing a high immunogenic organ, which is certainlyone of the major obstacles for int estinal allograftacceptance. The allograft has to guarantee the properfunctioning of the mucosal immune machinery underimmunosuppr ess ive conditions. Recently, it has beeneluc idated that isolated lymphoid fo llicles (ILFs) are anindispensable part of mucosal immunity to maintainIgA synthesis and consequently to control commensalmicroflora. No data about these follicular structures inthe setting of ITx are available so far. Therefore, weaddressed the question whether constitution, integrityand function of allograft ILFs are disturbed by immuno-suppressive regimen. We compared allograft ILFs fromterminal ileum of transplant patients with ILFs fromnontransplant patients via flow cytometry, quantitativereal-time polymerase chain reaction and immunohis-tochemistry. We found that host leukocytes rapidlyrepopulate allograft ILFs and that maintenance immu-nosuppressive regimen, tac rolimus and corticosteroids,does not affect their cellular integrity and function.However, allograft ILFs revealed a higher maturationstate than control samples and IgA positive plas ma cellswere increased in number in allograft mucosa. Ourresults open the pat h for a better understanding ofallograft mucosal immunity.