Expression of Pro- and Antiapoptotic Factors in Multinuclear Macrophages of BCG-Infected Mice In Vitro.

Intraperitoneal infection of Mycobacterium tuberculosis from BCG vaccine to male BALB/c mice provoked the formation of multinuclear macrophages in the peritoneal transudate. In 2 and 3 months after infection, their number increased respectively by 34.4 and 66.7% in comparison with intact mice. At all postinfection terms, far greater amounts of caspase 3, p53, Bad, and TNFα were expressed by multinuclear macrophages than by the mononuclear ones. At these terms, the content of Bcl-2-expressing macrophages with different numbers of nuclei was pronouncedly high; of them, the number of multinuclear macrophages was maximum. In 3 months after infection, the number of macrophages expressing Bcl-2 significantly decreased irrespective of the number of their nuclei. At this term, the number of macrophages expressing caspase 3, and TNFα also decreased. In parallel, the number of macrophages expressing p53 and Bad somewhat increased. These data attest to potentiality ("readiness") of macrophages infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis to apoptotic self-elimination.