Human Immunoglobulin M Memory B Cells Controlling Streptococcus pneumoniae Infections Are Generated in the Spleen
By Stephanie Kruetzmann, M. Rosado, H. Weber, U. Germing, O. Tournilhac, H. Peter, R. Berner, Anke M. J. Peters, T. Boehm, A. Plebani and 2 more. Journal of Experimental Medicine, 2003
679 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Splenectomized and asplenic patients have a high incidence of infections by encapsulated bacteria and do not respond to polysaccharide vaccines. To understand whether the absence of the spleen is associated with a defined B cell defect, we analyzed B cell subsets in the peripheral blood. We found that a population of B cells known as immunoglobulin (Ig)M memory is lacking in patients without spleen. The absence of IgM memory B cells correlates with an impaired immune response to encapsulated bacteria not only in splenectomized patients, but also in individuals with an intact spleen. We show that the physiological and transient predisposition to pneumococcal infections of young children (0–2 yr) is associated with the lack of circulating IgM memory B cells and of serum antipolysaccharide IgM. We also demonstrate that IgM memory B cells are undetectable in a fraction of patients with common variable immunodeficiency, who have recurrent and invasive infections by encapsulated bacteria. IgM memory B cells, therefore, require the spleen for their generation and/or survival and are responsible for the protection against encapsulated bacteria.
Subfields: Epidemiology, Genetics, Surgery
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/387be1fff7c96703f09a4b7f4417d2a04d3a17c3
How researchers see this paper
The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.
In Epidemiology
In Genetics
Citations in the corpus
- Human B1 cells in umbilical cord and adult peripheral blood express the novel phenotype CD20+CD27+CD43+CD70− (2011, background): “The report that anti-Streptococcus pneumoniae IgM memory B cells are generated in the spleen (Kruetzmann et al., 2003) is reminiscent of previous reports on mouse B1 cells indicating they also require the spleen for development (Wardemann et al., 2002), and again raises the possibility that at…”
- B cells in HIV infection and disease (2009, background): “, a phenotype that is also seen in splenectomized individuals, who are also more susceptible to pneumococcal infectio”
- Heterosubtypic Neutralizing Monoclonal Antibodies Cross-Protective against H5N1 and H1N1 Recovered from Human IgM+ Memory B Cells (2008, background): “It has been proposed that circulating B cells with this phenotype are linked to marginal zone B cells and have a primary role in T independent immunity [19,20], while others argue they are formed as part of an intermediate differentiation step in normal T dependent germinal centre immune responses [”
- Neonatal adaptive immunity comes of age (2004, background): “A parallel situation exists for so-called IgM-expressing memory B cells in human”