crucial role for B cells in neuroinvasive scrapie

• Published in: Nature (London) Vol. 390; no. 6661; pp. 687 - 690
• Main Authors: Klein, M.A, Frigg, R, Flechsig, E, Raeber, A.J, Kalinke, U, Bluethmann, H, Bootz, F, Suter, M, Zinkernagel, R.M, Agussi, A
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing 18.12.1997; Nature Publishing Group
• Subjects: Animals; B-lymphocytes; B-Lymphocytes - immunology; Biological and medical sciences; Blotting, Western; Bovine spongiform encephalopathy; Brain - pathology; cell invasion; Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease; Degenerative and inherited degenerative diseases of the nervous system. Leukodystrophies. Prion diseases; disease development; histopathology; Immune system; immunosuppression (physiological); Lymphatic system; Lymphocytes; Medical sciences; Mice; Mice, Inbred C57BL; Mice, SCID; Neurology; pathogenesis; prions; Prions - immunology; Proteins; Rodents; scrapie; Scrapie - immunology; Scrapie - pathology; Scrapie - physiopathology; Animal model; Nervous system diseases; Scrapie; Pathogenesis; Rodentia; B-Lymphocyte; Cerebral disorder; Infection; Virus; Vertebrata; Mammalia; Mouse; Central nervous system disease; Degenerative disease; Slow virus
• ISSN: 0028-0836; 1476-4687
• DOI: 10.1038/37789

Although prion proteins are most efficiently propagated through intracerebral inoculation, peripheral administration has caused the diseases kuru, iatrogenic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) and new-variant CJD. The development of neurological disease after peripheral inoculation depends on prion expansion within cells of the lympho-reticular system. Here we investigate the identity of these cells by using a panel of immune-deficient mice inoculated with prions intraperitoneally: we found that defects affecting only T lymphocytes had no apparent effect, but that all mutations that disrupted the differentiation and response of B lymphocytes prevented the development of clinical scrapie. As an absence of B cells and of antibodies correlates with severe defects in follicular dendritic cells, a lack of any of these three components may prevent the development of clinical scrapie. However, we found that scrapie developed after peripheral inoculation in mice expressing immunoglobulins that were exclusively of the M subclass and without detectable specificity for the normal form of the prion PrPc, and in mice which had differentiated B cells but no functional follicular dendritic cells. We conclude that differentiated B cells are crucial for neuroinvasion by scrapie, regardless of the specificity of their receptors.