Protective effect of apotransferrin against tissue injury induced by allogeneic T cells. Iron accumulation in the liver and hepatic and intestinal injury after transplantation of allogeneic T cells to NOD/SCID mice. (A) NOD/SCID mice (H-2d) underwent transplantation with 3 × 107 allogeneic lymphocytes from C57BL6 mice (H-2b), following injection of saline (middle panel) or human apotransferrin (1 mg/mouse; right panel) 24 and 2 hours before T-cell infusion. Livers from untreated mice served as additional controls (left panel). (B) Hepatic iron content (HIC) as determined by colorimetric assay (mean ± 1 SD) on day 14 after the infusion of saline and either no cells or syngeneic or allogeneic cells, respectively (3-8 mice per group). (C) Histology of the duodenum and (D) liver, representative for the 3 groups of mice described in panel A. (E) Serum transaminase levels (mean ± 1 SD) in controls (blue column) and mice on day 14 after infusion of allogeneic T lymphocytes after pretreatment with saline (red column) or apotransferrin (green column). (F) Weight changes in mice from panel E over the 14-day course of the experiment. Beyond day 7 body weight was significantly higher in ApoTf pretreated than in saline pretreated mice (P < .05 to P < .02 by Student t test, calculated on days 7 and 14).
