Feedback control of the secondary antibody response. II. Differences in the rate of induction of T-helper and T-suppressor memory.

There is a radical change in the cooperative behaviour of the thymus-dependent B-memory cell after adoptive transfer to irradiated recipients. It acquires the ability to recruit suppressors on further transfer with carrier primed spleen cells. This suppressor inducer activity has provided a probe to study the development of feedback mechanisms after primary immunization. Here, we have shown that helper and suppressor activity exhibit different rates of induction after immunization but both reside in a long-lived memory population.