Epstein Barr virus transformation of peripheral blood B cells secreting antibodies reactive with cell surface antigens.

EBV transformable peripheral blood B cells secreting antibodies reactive with cell surface antigens present on two indicator human leukemia cell lines, NALM1 and U937, were studied. Oligoclonal EBV transformants from patients with a variety of diseases were frequently found to produce cell surface reactive antibodies. Antibody secreting transformants could also, although less frequently, be readily cultured from the PBM of normal volunteers, and represented, by limiting dilution, 1 out of 113 transformable B cells. CD8 antibody had no effect on the frequency of antibody producing B cells, but depletion of CD8+ cells by immunomagnetic methods prior to transformation significantly (P less than 0.05) increased the recovery of antibody secreting B cells to 1/33. Readdition of magnetically depleted cells did not significantly inhibit the transformation of these B cells. During the acute and recovery phases of some infections increasing numbers of these transformable antibody producing B cells appear in the circulation. The majority of antibodies produced were of the IgM class, although IgG antibodies were also detected. IgM antibody producing transformants were tested and some were found to react with autologous and allogeneic normal lymphocytes. These results lend support to the notion that B cells capable of secreting cell surface reactive antibodies, a proportion of which are autoreactive, are present in the normal repertoire of healthy adults, and that these cells are under active regulation by CD8+ cells.