Comparison of V kappa gene family expression in adult and fetal B cells
Teale, J.M.; Morris, E.G.
Journal of Immunology 143(8): 2768-2772
1989
ISSN/ISBN: 0022-1767 PMID: 2507639 Document Number: 343389
The functional B cell repertoires from adult and fetal mice were compared by examining V.kappa. gene family expression in individual cells. In addition, because little is known about the relative use of the various V.kappa. gene amilies in an immune response, adult B cells from several different strains of mice were analyzed. This was accomplished by stimulating B cells with the polyclonal activator, LPS. Activated cells were then analyzed for V.kappa. gene family expression at the single cell level by in situ hybridization using radiolabeled V.kappa. gene probes. It was found that all V.kappa. gene families tested were represented in the LPS-induced adult repertoire with V.kappa.1, V.kappa.4,5 and V.kappa.19 being expressed to the largest degree in all strains tested. The LPS-induced adult V.kappa. gene family repertoire was then compared to the fetal repertoire and some differences were observed. In particular, a lower proportion of fetal B cells expressed V.kappa.1 and a higher proportion of fetal B cells expressed V.kappa.4,5 and V.kappa.10. Importantly, compared with the adult response there was no evidence in the fetal response for an increased expression of V.kappa.21, the family that maps closest to J.kappa., C.kappa. This is in contrast to what has been shown previously with H chain V region exons in which there was a clear preference for the VH gene families that mapped closest to DH.