Immunodulation of intestinal transplantation: antilymphocyte serum donor pretreatment vs. ex vivo graft irradiation.

WE HAVE SHOWN the beneficial effects of an immunomodulation strategy for small intestinal transplantation (SITx) by depleting mature lymphocytes from the graft and simultaneously infusing progenitor-rich donor bone marrow (BM) cells.! In this study we evaluated the relative benefit of leukocyte elimination between ex vivo graft irradiation versus donor pretreatment with antilymphocyte serum (ALS) in a model of fully allogenic rat SITx. Special attention was paid to their impact on early immune responses after SITx by analyzing the levels and lineages of chimerism as well as the cytokine up-regulation in recipient spleen and allografts.