Production of anti-double-stranded DNA antibodies in activated lymphocyte derived DNA induced lupus model was dependent on CD4+ T cells.

Our previous study demonstrated that activated lymphocyte derived DNA (ALD-DNA) could function as an autoantigen to induce production of anti-double-stranded DNA (anti-dsDNA) antibodies in syngeneic BALB/c mice. Here we carefully evaluated the potential role of T cells in the induction of anti-dsDNA antibody. We demonstrated that ALD-DNA could effectively induce production of anti-dsDNA antibodies in vivo and in vitro. In contrast, ALD-DNA could not induce the generation of anti-dsDNA antibodies in nude mice. We further showed that in vivo depletion of CD3(+) T cells blocked the induction of anti-dsDNA antibodies in BALB/c mice. Notably, we demonstrated that CD4(+) but not CD8(+) T cells conferred ALD-DNA to induce anti-dsDNA antibodies. Finally, we demonstrated that adoptive transfer of CD4(+) T cells could rescue ALD-DNA induced anti-dsDNA antibodies in nude mice. Our results suggested that T helper cells were required for ALD-DNA to induce anti-dsDNA antibodies. These findings could further our understanding about the immunogenic properties of DNA and throw new light on SLE pathogenesis.