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Distribution of activated T cells migrating through the body: a matter of life and death

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0167-5699(99)01474-7Get rights and content

Abstract

The preferential distribution of lymphocyte subsets in tissues is attributed to a selective lymphocyte–endothelium interaction during entry. However, proliferation and death within the tissue, and exit from the tissue, might also play a role. Here, Jürgen Westermann and Ulrike Bode provide evidence that preferential survival in the tissue of initial stimulation is the major factor in the preferential distribution of activated T cells.

Section snippets

Short biography of naive, activated and memory T cells

T-cell precursors are released from the bone marrow into the blood (Fig. 1). These cells migrate to the thymus where they become thymocytes and undergo positive and negative selection. Each day about 1% are released as naive T cells into the periphery25.

Naive T cells continuously and randomly migrate through lymphoid and non-lymphoid organs (Fig. 1). Although naive T cells migrate back to both bone marrow and thymus26, 27, these organs are normally not considered their home, probably because

Preferential accumulation: increased proliferation and reduced cell death

The migration kinetics of activated T cells from two different sources (mLN and pLN) were recently investigated, including the analysis of cell proliferation and death19. T cells were activated via the T-cell receptor (TCR) and CD28, labelled, injected into rats and their localization within mLNs was analyzed19, 20. As expected21, 22, 23, 24, activated mLN T cells were found in significantly higher numbers in mLNs and the region drained by them (e.g. Peyer's patches and the lamina propria of

Perspectives

Activated T cells produce cytokines and express costimulatory molecules and can therefore induce the nonspecific proliferation of bystander lymphocytes40. Thus, the distribution of these potentially dangerous cells should be carefully regulated. Modifying the survival of activated T cells after random entry into the tissue represents an elegant way of making these cells available to the sites where they are needed, while retaining them in certain regions41. Such a mechanism might explain how

Conclusion

The current view on the regulation of lymphocyte migration postulates that preferences in lymphocyte distribution are mediated mainly during entry9, 12. Analyzing the migration of activated T cells, however, shifts the focus of this model by showing that preferential survival within the tissue is responsible for the preferential accumulation. It is unlikely that proliferation and death play a major role in the distribution of naive and memory T cells because the magnitude of migration7, 32 by

Unlinked list

51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61

Acknowledgements

We thank all our colleagues in the Dept of Functional and Applied Anatomy for their continuous support, especially K. Bankes, I. Dressendörfer, S. Lopez-Kostka, A. Reuße and F. Weidner. We gratefully acknowledge R. Pabst (Hannover), M. Schedlowski (Essen) and H. Westermann (Westermann & Partner, Hannover) for critical reading of the manuscript; M. Peter for help in preparing the figures; and S. Fryk for correcting the English. J.W. and U.B. were supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft

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