Ontogenic development of B cell reactivities to cooperative cell signals: dissociation between proliferation and antibody secretion.

Cloned helper T cell lines, with specificity for "minor" antigens expressed on all B lymphocyte (and macrophage) surfaces were used to study the postnatal development of B cell reactivity to helper T cell cooperative signals. Such helper T cell populations, upon physiologic interactions with "target" B lymphocytes, activate them polyclonally, allowing for the analysis of functional ontogeny independent of V gene repertoires. Due to the high frequency of responding cells, these methods also offer a high level of sensitivity and permit measurement of B cell proliferation in the absence of antibody production. The results demonstrate that neonatal spleen cells are fully competent to stimulate adult helper T cell responses and that neonatal and adult B cells are comparable in their proliferative responses to cooperative cell interactions. In contrast, a marked deficiency in the ability of neonatal cells to mature to immunoglobulin secretion was observed in the same responses. Since the presence of suppressive activities in neonatal spleen cells could not be demonstrated, it was concluded that "early" B lymphocytes are intrinsically defective in their ability to secrete immunoglobulin upon cooperative induction, whereas they show full competence to expand clonally.