Spontaneous hypertension and hypertensive vascular disease in the NZB strain of mice.

NZB nice spontaneously develop a high blood pressure and hypertensive vascular disease in the heart and the kidney. Treatment with cyclophosphamide decreased the level of blood pressure; congenital athymic nude NZB mice failed to develop a high blood pressure. These findings suggest that thymus and the thymus-dependent immune reactions have pathogenic importance for the spontaneous hypertension in these mice.