Impact of thymus on the generation of immunocompetence and diversity of antigen-specific MHC-restricted cytotoxic T-lymphocyte precursors.

Beryllium-induced disturbances of the murine immune system reflect some phenomena observed in sarcoidosis.

Sarcoidosis is a systemic granulomatous disorder of unknown origin. In respect to clinical and immunological characteristics, it is indistinguishable from berylliosis. As an approach to develop a murine model reflecting some aspects of sarcoidosis, we attempted to induce berylliosis in mice by treating inbred F1 mice (C57B16 x DBA/2) with 3 mg beryllium sulfate (BeSO4) per kg body weight intraperitoneally. Either pure BeSO4 or BeSO4 in combination with incomplete Freund's adjuvant was administered. Alternatively, pure BeSO4 was injected 2 days after a single application of cyclophosphamide (150 mg/kg). The spleen index, the spontaneous and phorbolmyristate acetate (PMA)-induced radical oxyg…

Inhibition of the epidermal growth factor receptor tyrosine kinase activity by leflunomide.

AbstractThe active metabolite of leflunomide, A77 1726 inhibits the proliferation of a variety of mammalian cell lines in culture. Epidermal growth factor (EGF)-dependent proliferation is inhibited by A77 1726 at an effective dose of 30–40 μM. A77 1726 appears to directly inhibit the EGF receptor tyrosine-specific kinase activity both in intact cells and purified EGF receptors at the same effective dose. These data suggest that leflunomide inhibits cellular proliferation by the inhibition of tyrosine-specific kinase activities.