ENHANCING ACTIVITY OF VARIOUS IMMUNOAUGMENTING AGENTS ON THE DELAYED-TYPE HYPERSENSITIVITY RESPONSE IN MICE

Abstract

Six immunoaugmenting agents were tested in the delayed-type hypersensitivity reaction (DTH) in normal BALB/c .times. DBA/2 mice. The agents tested, levan, lentinan, mannozym, maleic anhydride divinyl ether, polyriboinosinic-polycytidylic acid-poly-L-lysine and highly purified L-cell interferon, gave significant increases in the DTH responses above the sheep red blood cell control. The schedule of doses for each agent corresponded with previous experiments of the maximum natural killer cell activity, macrophage activation and interferon induction. Highly purified L-cell interferon was capable of eliciting a significant DTH response when given 4 h after the initial challenge with sheep erythrocytes. In addition, .lambda.-carrageenan, a macrophage-cytotoxic agent which can render the macrophage inactive, suppressed the DTH response to levels slightly above phophate-buffered saline controls. The carrageenan-induced suppression of the DTH response could be abrogated by coadministration with immunoaugmenting agents to levels attained with the immunoaugmenting agents alone.