Germfree rats monocontaminated with the anaerobic microorganisms Clostridium difficile or another Clostridium species (strain G 62) produce auto-antibodies to colon antigen. The antigen can be extracted with phenol water from the feces of germfree rats. Antibodies, demonstrable by means of passive hemagglutination of antigen sensitized sheep erythrocytes appear after monocontamination for 35 days or longer. The indirect immunofluorescence techniques, applied to sections of germfree rat colon, gave positive mucosal staining. The staining was similar to that obtained with sera from patients with ulcerative colitis or from rats immunized with rabbit colon. No antibodies were found in the sera of germfree rats, germfree rats monocontaminated with various other bacteria, conventional rats of germfree origin, or conventional Sprague-Dawley rats. Although the anti-colon antibodies of the Clostridium infected rats reacted with the same feces extract as the antibodies of ulcerative colitis patients or of rabbit colon immunized rats, their specificity was different. While the latter cross-react with polysaccharide from E. coli O14, those from the Clostridium-infected exgermfree rats did not. Rats monocontaminated with Cl. difficile also developed antibodies to this organism, but no cross-reaction between Cl. difficile antigen and colon antigen could be demonstrated. This speaks against breakage of tolerance by cross-reacting bacterial antigen as the cause of autoimmunity in these rats. Other possible mechanisms for autoantibody production in this model are immunogenic alteration of gastrointestinal mucins by bacterial degradation, adjuvant effects of bacterial products, or both.

Animals↗

PubMed1969

Immunization with inactivated poliovirus vaccine and attenuated type 3 poliovirus. I. Vaccination with the WM3 strain in 20 families.

Explore the source record for details and available documents.

Age Factors↗

PubMed1968

Immunological studies in ulcerative colitis. IV. Origin of autoantibodies.

The incidence and height of antibody titers to colon, assayed by indirect hemagglutination with a heat stable colon extract from germ free rats, is significantly higher in sera from patients with ulcerative colitis than in those from healthy controls or from patients with amebic liver abscess or dysentery. While sera from ulcerative colitis patients and controls are indistinguishable in regard to incidence and height of antibody titers to Forsman antigen, Staphylococcus aureus S 209, Clostridium difficile, and several common strains of E. coli, they have elevated titers and increased incidence of antibodies to a heat stable antigen of E. coli O14. Patients with amebic dysentery have normal titers of such antibodies. Absorption of patients' sera with E. coli O14 antigen inhibits the colon directed hemagglutination reaction in approximately 30% of the cases tested. Likewise, the anti-E. coli O14 reaction can sometimes be inhibited with the colon extract. Other E. coli strains and other bacteria are inactive or have only weak inhibitory activity. Hemagglutination inhibition experiments show that germ free rat colon and E. coli O14 contain common structures, depicted by antibodies in the patients' sera. This pattern of reactivity closely resembles that seen in rats made autoimmune to colon by injection of newborn rabbit colon. E. coli O14 is known to carry a heterogenetic antigen present in lower concentration (or activity) in most Enterobacteriaceae. Hemagglutination inhibition experiments with rabbit antisera to E. coli O14 suggest that the antigen common for E. coli O14 and colon is related to this heterogenetic antigen. The findings imply that this antigen, which is constantly present in low concentrations in the human colon, may give rise to anticolon antibody formation in ulcerative colitis through breakage of tolerance. Since this antigen is present in healthy individuals as well, additional factors are required to explain the induction of anti-colon autoimmunity in ulcerative colitis.

Animals↗

PubMed1967