Original Article Characterization of Donor Dendritic Cells and Enhancement of Dendritic Cell Efflux With cc-Chemokine

Dendritic cells (DCs) are the most potent antigen-present-ing cells, yet little data are available on the differential characteristics of donor and recipient DCs (dDCs and rDCs, respectively) during the process of islet allograft rejection. DTR-GFP-DC mice provide a novel tool to mon-itor DC trafficking and characteristics during allograft rejection. We show rapid migration of dDCs to recipient lymphoid tissues as early as 3 h post–islet allotransplanta-tion. Compared with rDCs, dDCs express different patterns of chemokine receptors, display differential proliferative capacity, and exhibit a higher level of maturity; these findings could be attributed to the effects of injury that dDCs undergo during islet cell preparation and engraft-ment. Intriguingly, we detected dDCs in the spleen of recipients long after rejection of islet allografts. Given tha