Activation of transplant immunity: effect of donor leukocytes on thyroid allograft rejection.

The survival of thyroid allografts in mice was prolonged by either holding the grafts in vitro culture for 20 to 27 days or by cobalt-60 irradiation of the donor 2 days before transplantation with or without the intravenous injection of colloidal carbon just before removing the thyroid from the donor. In both cases the rejection process was restored by an intravenous injection of recipients with living peritoneal exudate cells (50 to 80 percent macrophages) syngeneic to the thyroid donor.