Pertussigen in vivo enhances antigen-specific production in vitro of lymphokine that stimulates macrophage procoagulant activity and plasminogen activator.

Pertussigen is a protein toxin of Bordetella pertussis that acts as a powerful stimulator of the intensity and duration of delayed-type hypersensitivity (DTH) in mice. This study describes the potent in vivo effect of pertussigen on the levels of antigen-specific macrophage-activating lymphokine(s); lymphokine(s) was measured by the stimulation of macrophage procoagulant activity (mPCA), or plasminogen activator (PA) activity. Lymphoid cells were removed from immunized animals and cultured with specific antigen, keyhole limpet hemocyanin, ovalbumin, or human gamma-globulin. The culture supernatants were then incubated with the monocyte-like cell line WEHI-265 to measure mPCA or with WEHI-265 or resident peritoneal macrophages to measure PA activity. Mice were given pertussigen at the time of immunization, and the subsequent generation by lymphocyte supernatants of both of these macrophage activities proved to be greatly enhanced; the effect of pertussigen was antigen specific. Pertussigen thus induces an increase in lymphokine(s) production responsible for the in vitro increase in macrophage mPCA and PA activity and which may be responsible for some of the potent immune effects of this agent in vivo.