THE ROLE OF MAJOR AND MINOR HISTOCOMPATIBILITY ANTIGENS IN ORTHOTOPICCORNEAL TRANSPLANTATION IN MICE

The mouse model of orthotopic corneal transplantation was used to eval uate the clinical course of corneal graft rejection process. Corneal g rafts were placed into eyes of naive, unmodified recipients or recipie nts presensitized with skin graft two weeks before corneal transplanta tion. Two strain combinations were used, one with genetic disparity at both major and minor histocompatibility antigens and the other with t he difference only at multiple minor histocompatibility antigens. A pa nel of syngeneic graft recipients served as controls. In naive recipie nts, rejection reaction was recorded in more than 90% of recipients mo stly during the third week after grafting and 40 - 50% of corneas disp layed irreversible failure in both strain combinations. Both MHC compa tible and incompatible corneal grafts in all presensitized recipients were irreversibly rejected by a second-set allograft reaction, The res ults thus show an important role of multiple minor histocompatibility antigens in corneal allotransplantation in mice. In addition, the prom pt reaction in presensitized recipients is evidence for expression of allotransplantation immunity in the eye, which has been for a long tim e considered as a privileged site sequestered from systemic immunity.