Absent Joining Chain Effect on Immune Response

Absent Joining Chain Effect on Immune Response Critical Review of a Journal Kallberg, E. and Leanderson, T., 2006. Joining-chain (J-chain) negative mice are B cell memory deficient. European Journal of Immunology, 36, 1398-1403. Overview The journal article falls under the main subject area of cellular immune response, where the effect of the absence of joining chain locus on T- cell dependent immune responses on mice was explored. While the authors’ previous study establishes the production of impaired IgM secretion from mice with inactivated joining chain locus, (Erlandsson, et.al., 20010), this particular study further investigated such findings in detail by determining the exact genetic background of the mice. Thus, this particular study aimed to further validate the authors’ previous findings on early crosses of mice with absent joining chain and its concomitant effect on T-cell dependent immune response. The T- cell dependent B cell responses were analyzed using four experiments, namely: the immune response t o the hapten 4-hydroxy-3-nitrophenyl and chicken gamma globulin (NP-CGG); analysis of the ratio between NP-specific ÃŽÅ¡ and ÃŽ » antibodies; analysis of somatic mutations, and carrier priming experiment. It was found that mice with absent joining chain loci are deficient in â€Å"T helper cell activation during T cell –dependent B cell immune responses†, (Kallberg and Leanderson, 2006). This study was aptly technically described and appeals to an audience in the medical field such as immunologists, physicians, laboratory and clinical directors, etc. It consists of the following format: abstract, introduction, results, discussion, materials and methods, acknowledgements and references. Introduction The title appropriately indicates the effect of J-chain deficiency on B memory, which is the focal point of this study. Its well structured abstract completely and vividly presented the major points and the conclusion of the study. The objective, which can be found in the la tter part of the introduction, however, was not clearly identified in the abstract and the text, but needs to be carefully ascertained by the reader. Results The experimental results of the four experiments produced findings that correlate to and support the hypothesis of the study, i.e., J -/- mice have compromised T-cell dependent immune response. The specific findings are as follows: Joining- chain deficient mice have compromised secondary immune response to 4-hydroxy-3nitrophenyl. Although J -/- mice responded in the same way with the control group during the analysis of serum IgG anti-NP at all time points, there was a wide difference observed on after the 14 th day point, which was clearly supported and plotted in the graph (Figure1). After the secondary response to NP-CGG, it was found that the recall response in mice without joining chain loci are lower than the control animals, which was further correlated to a lower number of B memory cells. All raw data of the resu lts pertaining to these findings were well supported by graphs (figures1-3). Mice without joining-chain have inefficient repertoire switch Results showed that only 30% of the NP-binding antibodies in J -/- mice were expressed, while 90% of the antibodies of the control animals were expressed, confirming the negative effect of the joining chain on the efficiency of T-cell immune responses. This was supported by a bar graph of the results and a graphical illustration of the NP expression on splenic B memory cells.