[Brain barriers and the problem of autoimmunity in neurology]. / Mozgovye ba'rery i problema autoimmuniteta v nevrologii.

Blood-brain barrier (BBB) permeability for the blood lymphocytes was experimentally investigated along with the central nervous system and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) autoimmunity. Labelled autologous lymphocytes were infused into the blood of 16 dogs and their CSF (cysterna magna) lymphocytes were radiometrically investigated in order to study the blood lymphocyte BBB permeability. Immunity and autoimmunity states were studied in 26 patients with acute cerebral infarction, 12 patients with serous meningitis and 10 with brain contusions. The data indicated that intact BBB is impermeable for the peripheral blood lymphocytes. Vascular, infectious and traumatic brain lesions deteriorate the BBB barrier that is conductive to peripheral blood lymphocytes penetration causing an autoimmune cellular and humoral response.

[The concept of the immunologic barrier of the brain]. / Kontseptsiia immunnogo bar'era mozga.

Using the technique of a two-layer agar system, the authors cultivated cerebrospinal fluid cells from 9 patients with aseptic lymphocytic meningitis and from 6 clinically healthy subjects. On the 7th-15th day of culturing growth of colonies (cellular aggregates) was detected. Morphologic analysis of the colonies demonstrated that they consisted only of lymphoid and mixed (macrophagal-granulocytic) cells. To study the immunologic function of microglia, the cerebral tissue obtained from 11 patients with cerebral gliomas was cultivated. Antigenic stimulation resulted in activation of microglia cells and in their transformation into macrophages. The precursor cells, T- and B-lymphocytes, their subpopulations, monocytes, macrophages and cells of central nervous system microglia form an immunologic barrier of the brain ensuring the immunologic surveillance in the extra-barrier organ--the central nervous system.

[Composition and physiologic functions of spinal fluid]. / Nekotorye dannye o sostave i fiziologicheskikh funktsiiakh likvora.

The cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) was examined by the immunological method in 24 patients with mature, and 35 patients with immature cerebral tumours, as well as in 10 patients with Guillain Barre's and 16 patients with Landry's polyneuritis. The control group consisted of 42 patients who had no nervous pathologies. The immunomorphological composition of the normal CSF, as well as the CSF in polyneuritis and brain tumours was disclosed. The presence of lymphoid cells of various populations, and immunoglobulins of various classes in the normal CSF was demonstrated. On the basis of the data obtained the authors come to a conclusion that one of the basic CSF functions is an immunological, but not only nutritional and metabolic ones, as it has been thought before. The presence of a specific protective immunological cerebral barrier in the central nervous system is substantiated. This barrier is formed by the T- and B-lymphocyte systems. These lymphocytes also exercise the immunological control in the subarachnoidal space.

[Phenomenon of cerebrospinal fluid lymphocyte blast-transformation in several inflammatory diseases of the nervous system]. / Fenomen blasttransformatsii limfotsitov likvora pri nekotorykh zabolevaniiakh nervnoi sistemy

Morphological and autoradiographical studies of leukocyte cultures of the CSF in 20 patients with serous meningoencephalitis of a diverse etiology permitted the authors to establish the following condition. There is a phenomenon of lymphocyte blastransformation under the influence of phytohemagglutinine (PHA) and tuberculin. These data made it possible to suppose of the existence of T2-lymphocytes in the CSF. A correlation between the obtained data and the clinical picture demonstrated that 30-50% of the lymphocytes respond to PHA, irrespective of the etiology of meningoencephalitis, while blasttransformation to tuberculin occurs only in tuberculous meningoencephalitis. The authors attribute an important practical role to these findings for a differential diagnosis between obliviated forms of tuberculous meningoencephalitis and serous meningoencephalitis of a nontuberculous origin. These data give ground to assume that the CSF and the lymphocytes circulating in it form a strong immunological "mobile" barrier to the brain.

[Cerebrospinal fluid T- and B-lymphocytes in serous meningitis]. / T- i B-limfotsity v spinnomozgovoi zhidkosti pri seroznykh meningitakh

By means of PHA-tests and rosette-formation the authors detected in the CSF of patients with serous meningitis T- and B-lymphocytes. They assume that in serous meningitis the penetration of alien antigens into the subarachnoidal space facilitates the migration of T- and B-lymphocytes into the CSF from the lymphoid organs and peripheral blood. On the grounds of these data the authors propose a new concept which assumes that besides the hematoenecephalic barrier, there is also an immunological brain barrier, the morphofunctional basis of which is the CSF with circulating T- and B-lymphocytes and immunoglobulins of different classes.