Role of Gender in Animal Transplantation

Abstract

The interesting observation of male-specific minor histocompatibility was interestingly achieved in rodent transplantation model in 1955, in which isogeneic male skin graft was rejected in the female recipient, but not for other combinations such as female to male, female to female, and male to male (Eichwald and Silmser, Transplant Bull 2:148–149, 1955), implying that gender mismatch plays an important role in graft survival. The underlying mechanism was not unraveled until Dr. Scott et al. identified the mouse male-specific transplantation antigen, H-Y, in 1995 (Scott et al., Nature 376:695–698, 1995). Various H-Y epitopes derived from intracellular proteins can cause genotypically identical graft rejection through their expressions on the cell surface with mouse H-2K^K major histocompatibility class I or II (MHC) molecules and subsequent recognitions in an MHC-restricted fashion by host H-Y-specific T lymphocytes, eliciting an anti-H-Y immunoresponse (Scott et al., Nature 376:695–698, 1995). Immunological destruction causes graft rejection or graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) following bone marrow transplantation. Nevertheless, the response to H-Y is in big variation among mice strains dependent largely on quantitative or qualitative differences in H-Y expression of male graft and host’s responsiveness to H-Y.