Failure to Suppress the Expansion of the Activated Cd4 T Cell Population in Interferon γ–Deficient Mice Leads to Exacerbation of Experimental Autoimmune Encephalomyelitis

Mice deficient in interferon (IFN)-γ or IFN-γ receptor develop progressive and fatal experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE). We demonstrate that CD4 T cells lacking IFN-γ production were required to passively transfer EAE, indicating that they were disease-mediating cells in IFN-γ knockout (KO) mice. IFN-γ KO mice accumulated 10–16-fold more activated CD4 T cells (CD4(+)CD44(hi)) than wild-type mice in the central nervous system during EAE. CD4(+)CD44(hi) T cells in the spleen and central nervous system of IFN-γ KO mice during EAE showed markedly increased in vivo proliferation and significantly decreased ex vivo apoptosis compared with those of wild-type mice. IFN-γ KO CD4(+)CD44(hi) T cells proliferated extensively to antigen restimulation in vitro and accumulated larger numbers of live CD4(+) CD44(hi) T cells. IFN-γ completely suppressed proliferation and significantly induced apoptosis of CD4(+)CD44(hi) T cells responding to antigen and hence inhibited accumulation of live, activated CD4 T cells. We thus present novel in vivo and in vitro evidence that IFN-γ may limit the extent of EAE by suppressing expansion of activated CD4 T cells.