Studies on Brain Antigens

Pretreatment of guinea pigs with a purified bovine spinal cord protein (β1-SCP) prevented them from developing experimental allergic encephalitis (EAE) when they were subsequently challenged with an excessive dose of bovine spinal cord in complete Freund's adjuvant. In contrast, guinea pigs treated with protein obtained from bovine liver or with protein extracted from the gray matter of bovine brain developed EAE similar in severity to the disease induced in animals which had not been pretreated. When used to challenge guinea pigs, β1-SCP was not encephalitogenic at a level of 300 µg. This was the total amount of β1-SCP used for the pretreatment of each animal. The protective activity of the β1-SCP is assumed to be mediated by anti-SCP immunoglobulin but at this stage of our research the mechanism of the protective action is not clear. The protective action may not be directed specifically against lymphocytes sensitized to the encephalitogenic protein of myelin because anti-β1-SCP antibody did not react in immunodiffusion experiments with myelin isolated by differential centrifugation.